BR 

12.5 

H<o57 



■ 



1 



#91 



Am 



A 



3CCC 



C3f 









< in r - _ 

v <:<£c«c:< 









LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, 

Cliap...y.:^oi)j^ > glit No 

SJielli -tUftt 



UNITED STATES OF A YIERICA. 






^fc 
























«L«GC C 

c«rc <: 
CO < 



ClcOC 



««L< Cfl 



< < 

<rc: 

c 



<Z«C 






* < C S^-r^ c 









<:■■■<: 



c 


<C 


c 


«K 


cc 


<5«C 


<: 


<^r 


<r 


osr 


C 


<CC 


c 




"" CT 


*3I 



OC cO 



C c CTY CC 

C <? :■ C< ' 

c ccccc a 

tx rrcc 

g i cc < £ c 

£. C Cc r-C'cc f 

<T'<- c C CC CC 
C< Cr < 

^ <£<&c cr 
Cios c "<r.c -co. 

<-_cccc<:c cc 
"Xcccc cc 

:^f'<5r-<2 cc 

__r«<v«3er: c«: cc 

or- ..-3* ccc c << 






*f el ^M 



£ C <C<OC 

r «rc cc «» 

<c cc 

c cc:c^^ c 

"~cc c:<r 5< c 

<X CCC 

"-%cc<cc cc 



<C'CCC c c. 
" «.">cc ex c < 
^cccc C v. 
: cc cc c c 
r .cc cc< c , 

CCCC' c 

rccc ex c • 
4cc ^ 

rCC < 

- cc 



< *E£« C< 

c *iji cc« 
c ccc <r< 
> Seer ^ 

,vc<cc5v V 

■x . c «c ; « c 
i 



^ CC 



cc^c 









SIGNS 



OF THE 





TIMES. 



BY 



REV. IRA A. HOLBROOK, 
STILWATER, - OKLAHOMA. 



fcWLWB 



Dile 



u m To- h m- o; © 



BY 



REV. IRA A. HOIvBROOK. 



'Ye can discern the face of the sky ; but can ye not discern the signs 
of the times?" — Jesus. 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION 



BY 



PROF. P. A. WAUGH. M. S. 






(.MAY 5. VR96) 



GAZETTE PRINT, STILLWATER, OKLA. 

1395. 



::> £u&k~^ 



iDf.ro flaetioD. 



Many good people whose attention is 
quite worth the while fail to recognize 
the claim which religious thought has 
upon them — Preaching — which cannot 
reach all people through the channels 
of reason — is to them wholly unreason- 
ing: religion — which is insincerely af- 
fected by some persons — is to them 
pure hypocrisy; the fundamental prin- 
ciples of Christianity — which are nec- 
essarily and preferably undemonstra- 
ble — are to them nothing but 
superstitious unreasonableness, hypoc- 
risy and superstition — these are the 
greatest bugbears, of the good people 
mentioned. These people are not 
that. They are reasonable, sincere, 
honest. They are the best people in 
the world, except some others of the 
same sort who have made their acute 
reasons to show them how reasonable 
is religion: who have brought their 
sincerity to the noble living of Chris- 
tian lives and whose horror of super- 
stition has helped them to lay hold on 
the eternal, though sometimes unde- 
monstrable, truths of God. 

What shall we do with these people? 
Evidently only one thing. They have 
the qualities that are needful in relig- 
ious life: and on these qualities we may 
build if we choose. If we attempt to 
convert them by contradicting or con- 
troverting all their well established 



notions we do a thing which is su- 
premely foolish from both sides; — we 
undertake the impossible, and could 
we succeed in overturning those no- 
tions we would destroy the best foun- 
dation ever offered for the building of 
Christian character. May it never be 
considered unorthodox to meet the e 
people with reason, sincerity and hon- 
esty! 

It is a fact that these peonje are 
today coming to respect and acknowl- 
edge more and more the claim whit* 
religion has upon them. I do not care 
to argue the proposition. I state it 
confidently as a fact, knowing and not 
oaring that a horde of pessimists are 
ever • busy repeating that society is, 
growing worse — politics becoming 
more depraved, business more faith- 
less, and science more agnostic Let 
them say it. Nobody believes them. 
Even they disbelieve themselves. The 
sincere and honest people of whom we 
speak believe it, and do not attempt to 
withstand it. In other departments of 
life where these good non-christiais 
have their being they are more and 
more laking religion into aoccount. 
And when I say religion, I do not re- 
fer to it in the abstract, but in the 
concrete. I mean systematized, organ- 
izad religion as expressed in the 
church. These people are beginning 



VI 



INTRODUCTION. 



to pay the same deference to religious 
opinion authoritatively expressed from 
the church as they do to business opin- 
ion expressed from the board of trade or 
to scientific opinion expressed from the 
universities. 

This means a great deal. It means 
that religion is reaching all men as 
science does. As long as science hid 
away in dark closets and spent its time 
searching for the philosopher's stone 
active people cared nothing for it. 
But when it took hold of the things of 
life, —printed our papers, carried our 
messages, cooked our meals and cured 
our diseases, — then it gained a glad 
recognition from everyboby. 

The scientist must take religion into 
account if he is ever to be more than a 
scientist, — if he is to be a man. The 
politician must take religion into ac- 
count if he, too, will be a man. And 
the man of business, if he aspires to be 
anything more than a scoundrel, must 
reckon with this great human force — 
and I assert that the scientist of today 
does so. It is a pernicious error to in- 
sist that modern scienceis infidel in its 
tendency. Modern science is reverent 
always, and in many cases profoundly 
religious. 

It is the unadmitted shame of relig- 
ion that it should be so, but science, 
above all other forms of teaching, has 
fostered the love of truth. And relig- 
ion, in the outcome, is gaining by it! 
For the scientist would be no scientist 
did he not accept the conclusions to 
which his honest investigations lead 
him. And inasmuch as the religion 
of the church is founded on the un- 
changeable truths of the universe, 
trust the scientist to verify it. 

The politician knows that he must 



lake medern religion into account, and 
he confesses it with joy or sorrow as he 
is an honest man or a rascal. The sin- 
cere and honest man who has been 
striving against discouraging odds to 
make goverment better rec ognize with 
joy the power of religious teaching 
in 1heir behalf. These worthy woikeis 
accept with delight the increasing 
measure of co-operation which they 
receive from the church. 

The business man knows better than 
ever that honesty is the best policy. 
But he has gone further than that.— a 
great deal further. He knows that 
any view of his calling which considers 
it merely a means of subsistence by 
margins on stocks or profits on goods is 
a mean and narrow, dwarfing and un- 
worthy, view. He is honest, net a"o:ie 
that he has to be: but because he can 
make his honesty a beneficent force in 
the world. — a force not different in 
quality or effect from ♦he honesty of 
the scientist, the statesman or the 
preacher. 

And religion, in turn, is recognizing 
all other callings: and seeing in them 
also the active forces which make men 
better and God nearer. Religion is 
more scientific in its thought and 
statement, more businesslike in its 
transnetions. and more statesmanlike 
in its policy. And so it has a right — 
made use of in the following sermons — 
to talk politics, business or science: 
and while these defer the church 
in its religious authority she should 
always accept their honest teachings 
as the foundation of her progress, and 
not as something to be overturned or 
destroyed. 

Frank A. Waugh. 
Burlington, Vermont. 1st Jan'v. 189a. 



efaGE, 



Most of these lectures have been giv- 
en during- the past two years. I have 
not aimed at the absolute solution of 
these mighty problems, but at exciting- 
interest in them, and as a result, His- 
torical and Biblical research. 

Nearly every sentence has had upon 
it a fervent prayer for the good of men 



and the glory of God. 

This little volume is now given to 
the public in the earnest hope that it 
may remove doubts, make duty plain, 
and conscience quick. 

IRA A. HOLBROOK. 
Stillwater, O. T., 

Dec. 25, 1895. 



GODtBDtS. 



PAGE. 

Christ, a Basal Truth, 3 

Christ, the Miracle Worker, 25 

The Church Question. 

What Constitutes a Valid Church, o- 

The Mission of the Church. - 35 

How to Tell the Church of Christ, - - - . - . _ . 39 

The Poor and the Gospel, 44 

Comeoutism, or No-Church, .-54 

Christian Science Considered, _._ -^ 

The Signs of the Times. 

. The Signs of the Times, - - -.- -•- _ _ _ (33 

The Drought, - - ■ 70 

Christian Socialism, - 7c 

Tests of Loyalty to Christ, '. _ go 

Preachers in Politics, 34 

The Labor Problem. - - . -. gg 

Money, __ 91 

Sermonettes. 

Thanksgiving, 1893. - - 92 

Thanksgiving, 1894, _ gg 

Christmas Greeting-. - - - - - - . _ _ jqi 

Power of the Invisible, 195 

Easter Sermon. ----.-_____ jQg' 



IN CBEATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



There is the truth of phenomena 
which everywhere makes its impress. 
Things are as they are but how come 
they so; and why do they continue to 
be as they have been, with little proba- 
bility, so far as we can see, of being- 
different to that they now are'? These 
are to the popular mind "Unanswer- 
able Questions," but are questions that 
the world continually tries to answer. 
Every science has to do with the solu- 
tion of some feature of this problem. 

Agnosticism is unable to see any ad- 
equate cause or any probable outcome 
of this whole affair. 

Atheism thinks it "happened the way 
is has, is all." 

Evolution thinks that from the first 
cause (which it is not its business to 
supply) the universe has developed, by 
an orderly process, into its present 
condition, for which process it attempts 
to account. 

Others think it was made "out of 
nothing," and some think it was 
"formed out of pre-existing materials. " 

The atheist is the agnostic gone to 
seed. The agnostic "don't know" and 
the atheist ' 'don't care" whence these 
things are, as long as neither he nor 
they cease* to be, as they now are. 

Is man the ideal of nature? Is he the 
height of perfection? Ask your con- 



sciousness. "Why do not the "laws of na- 
ture" themselves, evolve themselves 
into the supernatural, or into a higher 
order of law? 

If we, and all about us, are from a 
lower order of things, I agree with 
Drummond in calling it an "ascent," 
but it may be that Darwin's book title — 
"Descent of Man"— is correct, though 
the contents may be quite incorrect. 

If we are from the Gods— which cur- 
iously enough, is an almost universal 
idea — whether we bo Pantheistic or 
mono-theistic, we have evidently 
ascended: but if from apes, we have 
made considerable of an advance. But 
it is peculiar if, this "ape theory" be 
correct, that wo have come to a period 
and can go no farther. Nay, are ret- 
rograding, physically at least, for we 
read: "And. there were GIANTS in 
those days." 

It is only since we passed tho merid- 
ian of our strength; only since the ze- 
nith of our glory has faded— that we 
have learned of our(?) brute progeni- 
tors. But still greater is the advance 
if from the "unthinking" and "not liv- 
ing protoplasm of material we are 
come." 

If "the internal actions of the atoms 
generated heat, and heat life," whence 
is the origin of this internal action of 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



the atoms? 

I do not see that the mystery becomes 
more soluable as matter becomes more 
formidable. The vapor of La Place or 
Heackle— to defy the mists or the 
clouds, in the personnel of "Nebula," a 
hypothetical quantity diffused through 
an indefinite amount of space — makes 
the real origin of things no less obscure. 
Nor does the germ life theory specially 
help us, in ''looking to the rock from 
whence we are hewn, and the pit from 
whence we are digged," for it is in ef- 
fect but a species of spontaneity, teach- 
ing "inherent life in itself" and trans- 
mission of quality" in some indefinite 
quantity. It resolves itself into the 
question, which was first "the chicken 
or the egg?"' 

But if any of the foregoing theories 
are to be accepted and their mystery 
"swallowed," how are we to account 
for the stability of things in the one 
case and development of them in the 
others; and if we come from "nebulea," 
cooling, congealing, cohering, why 
dc*es it not continue so to do? Why are 
the fires at the centre of our sphere?— 
"He touches the hills and they smoke. " 

I confess that a self-existant, Infinite, 
Omnipotent, and Eternal God, as the 
first cause — and a continual cause for 
existing phenomena, is to me some- 
what of an insoluble mystery — at 
least to my reasoning powers unaided. 
But we require aids in every science 
and business— books, inventions, tele- 
scopes, microscopes— even the common 
eye-glass is an indispensable aid to 
vision, so, if the inventions of the day, 
and the appliances of the age can bring 
us only so far we should seek something 
more, something better. 

I have a book that claims for itself 
Divinity. Its recommendation is to 



"Test ALL, things, hold fast to that 
which is good." It asks of us in true, 
scientific style to "do that we may 
know" that we may then demonstrate. 
It claims to be the only ' 'positive" phil- 
osophy. It commends itself to my rea- 
son as a probable solution to the other- 
wise unaccountable. Taylor Lewis 
says: "This stands alone in the world, 
like the primeval granite of the Hima- 
layas among the latter geological for- 
mations." Its great antiquity is be- 
yond all disputation; it is older, cer- 
tainly, than history or philosophy. It 
was the drawing of anything called 
science, as is shown by the fact that 
everything is noted by its simplest 
phenorninal or optical name. There is 
no assigning of non-apparant causa- 
tions, except the continual going forth 
of the MIGHTY word." We are shut 
up to the conclusion of its subjective 
truthfulness, and its authenticity." 

I test it upon its own prescribed con- 
ditions, viz.: "If any man will do * * * 
he shall know * * * " and in so far as I 
comply with its conditions I obtain its 
results. Hence I am persuaded to ac- 
cept it as being what it claims to be — 
Divine. 

"The Book" is quite as clear in its 
enunciations as any metaphysical work 
can be — so plain that "he who runs 
may read." 

Upon the testimony of this work I 
propose to establish Christo-centricity. 

But I cannot here enter into a dis- 
cussion of the theological views of the 
personality, being, and nature of Jesus: 
(See further a chapter on "Christ, a 
Miracle Worker.") as Virginarian, 
Unitarian and Trinitarian; however I 
will suggest to you that "In the begin- 
ning GOD (Elohim)— Genasis 1-1. is 
plural. 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



I leave this sublime statement to call 
your attention to the opening of what 
has been termed "'The Second Genesis" 
St. John 1-1: "In the beginning was 
the Word and the Word was with God 
and the Word was God." 

In Him (the Word— God) was life and 
the life was the light of men. * * * 

"There was the true light that light- 
eth every man coming into the world." 
— John 1-9. (revised version) 

The opening statement of each Gen- 
esis, "In the beginning," negatives the 
doctrine of tho eternity of matter. The 
citations also raise certain queries, viz: 
The beginning of the world of matter 
and the world of men; or have they a 
beginning? They also assert the 
source from which these things, to- 
gether with life and light, are said to 
have come. 

IN THE BEGINNING— THE NON-ETER- 
NITY OF MATTER. 

Every effect must have an adequate 
cause. A cause is something having a 
real existance, having also power and 
an efficiency sufficient and appropriate 
to the effect produced. 

The idea of a cause is proved to be 
true by our own consciousness, by ap- 
pealing to the consciousness of other 
men, and it is shown in the universal 
belief that every effect must have a 
cause. 

The world is not self-existant and 
eternal. 

1. Every part of it, everything that 
enters into its composition is depend- 
ent and mutable. 

2. We have historical evidence that 
the race of man e. g. has not existed 
from eternity. 

3. "Tne evidence of geology is to 
the same effect regarding other ani- 
mals."— Dr. C. Hodges. 



Bp. Elliott says: "We have to ac- 
count for three beginnings — the begin- 
ning of the material Avorld, the begin- 
ning of life and the beginning of mind." 

"As to the idea of all things being 
potentially contained in atoms — our 
knowledge of these atomic forces so far 
as it at present extends, does not leave 
us in serious doubt as to their origin; 
for there is a very strong presumptive 
evidence drawn from the results of the 
most modern scientific investigations 
that they are neither eternal nor the 
products of evolution." — Prof. Prich- 
ard. 

Sir John Hearschel, from his con- 
templation of the remarkably constant 
definite and restricted yet various and 
powerful interactions of these elemen- 
tary molocules were forced to the con- 
viction that they possessed all the 
characteristics of manufactured arti- 
cles. 

Prof. Maxwell arrived at the same 
conclusion, he says: "No theory of evo- 
lution can be found to account for the 
similarity of the molecules throughout 
all time and throughout the whole re- 
gion of the stellar universe, for evolu- 
tion necessarily implies continuous 
change and the molecule is incapable 
of growth or decay, of generation or 
destruction. ' ' 

None of the processes of nature since 
nature began, have produced the 
slightest difference in the properties of 
any molecule. On the other hand, the 
exact quality of each molecule to all 
others of the same kind preclude the 
idea of being self-existant and eternal. 
We have reached the utmost limits of 
our thinking faculties when we have 
admitted that, because matter cannot 
be eternal and self-existant it must 
have been created. 

These molecules continue this day as 



6 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



they were created, perfect in number 
and measure and weight, and from the 
ineffaceable characters impressed on 
them, we may learn that those aspera- 
tions after truth in statement, and jus- 
tice in action, which we reckon among 
our noblest attributes as men, are ours 
because they are the essential constit- 
uents of the image of Him, who ''in the 
beginning" not only created the hea- 
ven and the earth but the materials of 
which heaven and earth consist. This 
is the true outcome or the deepest, the 
most exact and most recent science of 
the age. 

J. W. Dawson, L. L. D., F. R. S. &c. 
says: "That the universe must have 
had a beginning, no one now needs to 
be told. If any philosophical spectator 
ever truly held that there has been an 
eternal succession of phenomena, sci- 
ence has NOW completely negatived 
the idea, by showing us the beginning 
of all things that we know in the pres- 
ent universe, and by establishing the 
strongest probabilities that even its 
ultimate atoms could not have been 
eternal." 

William Fraser, L. L. D. &c. says: 
"By this positive exclusion of ETER- 
NITY from the existance of the uni- 
verse, and by repelling the idea of ac- 
cidental creation, the fact of a 'begin- 
ning is raised in the Bible not only 
above all the entangling speculations 
of recent philosophy, but above the 
boldest reasonings of modern sceptic- 
ism." 

"The earth is filled with evidence 
that it has not been going on FOREVER 
in the present state." — Sir William 
Thompson, F. R. S. 

"There is not an existing stratum in 
the body of the earth, which geology 
has laid bare, which cannot be traced 



back to a time when it was not. * * * 
Their 'beginnings 1 are discourable in 
succeeding cycles of time." — Sir Chas. 
Lyell, F. R. S. 

Dr. William Whewell says: "There 
must have been a commencement of 
the motions now going on in the solar 
system." 

Since these motions when once be- 
gun would be deranged and destroyed 
in a period which, however large, is 
yet finite, it is obvious we cannot car- 
ry their origin indefinitely backwards 
in the range of past duration. The 
argument is indeed forced upon our 
minds, whatever view we take of the 
past history of the world. 

"The doctrine of a resisting medium 
once established, renders the idea of 
the earth's eternity untenable: and 
compels us to go back to the origin, 
not only of the solar system itself, and 
thus sets us forth upon that path of re- 
search into the series of past causa- 
tions where we obtain no answer of 
which the meaning corresponds to 
our questions, till we rest in the con- 
clusion of a most provident and most 
powerful creating intelligence." 

Bishop Harvey Goodwin says: "De- 
sign or no design, purpose or no. pur- 
pose, a mass of matter cannot deter- 
mine its own quantity; the amount of 
energy which exists unchanged and 
unchangeable in a material system 
cannot determine its own amount: the 
straight lino in which the center of the 
system moves and the uniform velocity ; 
with which it moves cannot determin? 
themselves; yet all these things have 
been determined somehow. Therefore 
they must have been determined by an 
agent, which is outside the material 
system, or in other words, which is not 
itself material." 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



There may have been, so far as my 
judgment is concerned, no good pur- 
pose, nor any purpose at all, in the de- 
termination; but it is absolutely impos- 
sible to avoid the conclusion that a de- 
termining cause exists. I am disposed 
to call this result "a demonstration 
from natural premises of the existanco 
of the supernatational.' , 

"If matter is essentially inert, that 
is, if it cannot originate force or motion 
—every exhibition of force or motion 
in matter must originate in mind."— 
Joseph Cook. Hence the world of mat- 
ter is not eternal. 

"All things must necessarily arise 
from some first cause."— Cicero. 

It necessarily follows from the au- 
thorities that at least the first part of 
our proposition is established, viz: "In 
beginning/' or that the present course 
of things has not existed from all eter- 
nity, but it still remains to be shown 
that, by Jesus were all things made 
and "by him do all things consist." 

Now, if matter do not be eternal, and 
have in itself no power to determine its 
own quantity; and if it cannot cause Us 
own motion and determine its own line 
of direction; and if it must have had a 
beginning— a creation— and havo been 
set into motion, if the resisting medium 
of atmosphere be a truism, and would, 
in some finite duration disturb and des- 
troy the action and interaction; and if 
this creating cause and propelling 
force must be other than material— in 
what direction shall we look for its im- 
press? Unto what shall it be like? 
How shall- we apprehend it? Appre- 
hend, not comprehend, for we do not 
comprehend ourselves nor our most in- 
timate friend, though wo often appre- 
hend them, "now we know in part, but 
when that which is perfect— that which 
is complete is become to be our condi- 



tion — then that which is in part shall 
be done away." Science has long 
since apprehended a place for such a 
being as is now implied, but has never 
discovered the occupant. 

"Who by wisdom can find out God? 
We have found out a place for him— a 
need for him — but no scholasticism, 
however profound, breaks the silence. 
But, 

•'Still new beauties we thall see, 
And still increasing light." 

Geology has trimmed her waxen ta- 
pers, and astronomy her lamps, but 
God lighteth the blazing sun. 

In the beginning God created, 
caused to come into being. "Creation 
is the absolute bringing into existanco 
of the world by God. It is that act of 
God by which he, standing before and 
above all mundane and natural things, 
made and arranged the universe. It 
embraces everything that is not God." 
McClintock & Strong, 

Having no beginning in itself, but in 
that which is out of itself, everything 
Which is created owes to that principle 
of caution from which it came ,. not only 
its being but its powers. All existance 
and all power are in God; and every- 
thing which is not God has its exis- 
tance and its power from Him. 

These views indicate, in general 
terms, the relation of the created to 
uncreated; the relation of the creatures 
of God to God the creator. It is not 
only a relation which implies a begin- 
ning, on the part of the creatures, but 
a relation which implies their contin- 
ued dependence. The created not only 
come from God, but received from God; 
not only derive their existance of Him, 
but everpthing else.— "Divine Union." 
Thomas Upham says; "God only is 
eternal." 
Matthew 1-23 says of Jesus: "God 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



••Ami they shall all be taught of 
•I vi 25. 

I will give you a mouth ami wisdom 
rsaries .-hall not bo able 
to gainsay aor resist. Luke XXI-15. 

\\1V 14 >ays: "The Becrel 
of the Lord (God is with them that 
fear Him." 

Through such has come to us a reve- 
lation a Bhowing out of these myster- 
ies. It is the "PURE in heart" that 
shall see God. The path of the JUST 
that shineth more and more into the 
perfect day. It is to those who walk 
by faith that these discoveries are 
made, for "By faith we understand the 
worlds were framed by the Word (Lo- 
gos) of God." — Hebrew XI-3. 

Now, Faith is the assurance of things 
hoped for — or assurance cf things not 
seen as yet. 

Faith is based on evidence. Mark 
the distinction, evidence, not testimony 
only. 

Faith alone furnishes for the mystery 
of creation a key. It is by this and 
this alone that we understand the mode 
of formation. 

That Jesus was the Christ, Emanuel, 
The Logos, The Wonderful Counselor, 
The Everlasting Father, The Prince 
of Peace: will be shown in a subsequent 
chapter, but proceeding from the hy- 
pothesis of his Godhood, I quote from 
Uphams Divine Union, pages 7 to 9, af- 
ter which we shall carefully examine 
the Biblical record. Mr. Upham says: 
"God only Lb eternal." Such being the 
all things that exist out of him 
are and MUST be from him. To say 
a tiling has its berth from the bosom 
of its own causation, is the same as to 
that it exist* without a cause, and 
this is inconceivable. 



All things are therefore by the nec- 
essity of the ease in allegiance with 
God — the creatures of his divine and 
infinite administration; springing up 
in the appropriate day of their genera- 
tion, from the uncreated life; — the Life, 
which has been, now is, and will be 
everlasting. It is this truth, which, 
more than anything else, makes the 
eternity of God a matter of deep inter- 
est. It is the eternity of God which 
constitutes him, in one of the most es- 
sential respects, the universal Father. 
Fvery thing which exists, having be- 
fore the time of its existance no power 
or possibility of self-organization, must 
have had its berth Liom Him. And we 
may go farther, even than this; the 
fact of his eternity taken in connection 
with his other attributes, involves the 
idea that all things are not only from 
him but always have been and are now. 
in him. 

His eternity embraces the future as 
well as present. His mind sweeps 
over all, understands all, sustains all, 
regulates all, and unites all in one. 
The successive development of being 
and action which arrest and occupy 
the human mind in the different 
stages of their progress, are a present 
reality to him. Their causation does 
not remove them from that which 
causes; and out of him they must nec- 
essarily cease to be. And thus he is 
constituted by the very elements of 
his nature, the circumference as well 
as the center, the end as well as the 
beginning, the universal all. 

"In Him we live, move and have our 
being."— Acts XVII: 28. 

First. That from a first cause [which 
it is not its business to supply]. The 
universe has developed, by an orderly 
process, into its present condition, for 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



which process it attempts to account. 

J ' Wandering- oft, with brute unconscious gaze 
Man marks not him— marks not the mighty 
hand, 

That ever being, wheels the silent sphere,— 
And as on earth this grateful change revolves, 

With transport touches all the springs of life*" 

That man does not percoive this, is 
true. And ho docs not perceive it be- 
cause, trying 1 to see by his own light, 
and not in the Light which God him- 
self is ready to impart, his foolish 
heart is darkened. None can know 
God, in tho fullest sense ol the term, 
but those who are fully restored to 
him. Separated to a great distance by 
the repulsive power of selfishness, God, 
instead of being universal and the 
ALL, is not only very remote and much 
diminished in appearance, to those 
who are not in harmony with him, but 
even doubtful in existence 

"Tho fool hath said in his heart 
there is no God.". .Psalms XIV: 1. 

(Notice: "In his heart.'' A great 
many people have said so with their 
mouths and by their philosophy, but 
very few ever, "in their hearts.") 

But it does not follow, because God 
is not known, that he docs not exist, 
nor, because he is not realized as eter- 
nal that ho is not eternal. Existence 
does not depend upon perception. 

"The Light shincth in darkness and 
the darkness eomprchendeth it not." — 
John I: 5. 

God being the eternity of things is 
the reality. By reality we mean, that 
which is substantial and esontial, that 
which is permanent as well as that 
which is just and good; not the shadow 
<6f the rock (something that depends on 
something other than the rock also) 
but the rock itself; not the reflecting 
of the sun, but the sun itself; the I AM; 
as he names himself, because there is 



no other adequate expression of him, 
the being and not merely the begin- 
ning to be. His eternity envolves his 
essentiality, because we see no reason 
why he should begin to exist, so we see 
no reason why he should begin to 
change. Unchangeableness is only an 
attribute of eternity. 

Hence; some think the world under 
the law of FATE. But not so, God 
has foreordained effects not causes. 
Men and things are causes after they 
themselves have been caused, and 

"Whatsoever a man soweth that 
shall he also reap."— Galatians VI: 7. 
Not something else as evolution would 
have us think. See also Genesis I: 12. 

Now as our idea of God presents to 
us an occupant for the void of science, 
and an adequate cause for the course 
of things let us turn to his, at least 
purported, record— and any honest 
man can prove its truth by experience 
—for his modis-operandi. 

CHRISTO-CENTRICITY. 

In the beginning, of all time and 
created existence, was the Logos that 
gave form and being, to all materia. 
Therefore: "before the world was."— 
John XVII-r> and 24, or from all eter- 
nity was this "Word," this "Logos," 
this "Voice Sound," "God with us,"— 
Mathew 1-23. This which was "mani- 
fest in the flesh."— I Timothy 11-1(5. 
Ths that "became flesh."— John 1-14, 
was to God, as man's words and voice 
is to himself, the manifestation, or ex- 
pression of himself to those without 
him. Hence, was "with God."— John 
1-1. As a man's voice is with him— in 
him, and a "flesh" of him. "Was God" 
in nature, substance, essence, power, 
operation. That is the Logos enter- 
ing into flesh, becoming incarnate, be- 
coming flesh,, was but the mode of ex- 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



with 

••And they shall all be taught of 
hn VI 25. 

I w : .il give you a mouth and wisdom 
that your adversaries shall not be able 
to gainsay nor resist. Luke XXI-15. 

\\1V 14 says; "The secret 
of the Lord (God : .s with them that 
fear liim." 

Through such has come to us a reve- 
lation a showing out of these myster- 
ies. It is the "pure in heart" that 
shall see God. The path of the JUST 
that shineth more and more into the 
perfect day. It is to those who walk 
by faith that these discoveries are 
made, for "By faith we understand the 
worlds were framed by the Word (Lo- 
gos) of God." — Hebrew XI-3. 

Now. Faith is the assurance of things 
hoped for — or assurance cf things not 
seen as yet. 

Faith is based on evidence. Mark 
the distinction, evidence, not testimony 
only. 

Faith alone furnishes for the mystery 
of creation a key. It is by this and 
this alone that we understand the mode 
of formation. 

That Jesus was the Christ, Emanuel, 
The Logos, The Wonderful Counselor, 
The Everlasting Father, The Prince 
of Peace; will be shown in a subsequent 
chapter, but proceeding from the hy- 
pothesis of his Godhood, I quote from 
Uphams Divine Union, pages 7 to 9, af- 
ter- which we shall carefully examine 
the Biblical record. Mr. Upham says: 
"God only is eternal." Such being the 
case all things that exist out of him 
are and MUST be from him. To say 
a thing has its berth from the bosom 
of its own causation, is the same as to 
say that it exists without a cause, and 
this is inconceivable. 



All things are therefore by the nec- 
essity of the case in allegiance with 
God — the creatures of his divine and 
infinite administration; springing up 
in the appropriate day of their genera- 
tion, from the uncreated life; — the Life, 
which has been, now is, and will be 
everlasting. It is this truth, which, 
more than anything else, makes the 
eternity of God a matter of deep inter- 
est. It is the eternity of God which 
constitutes him, in one of the most es- 
sential respects, the universal Father. 

F very thing which exists, having be- 
fore the time of its existance no power 
or possibility of self-organization, must 
have had its berth f aom Him. And we 
may go farther, even than this; the 
fact of his eternity taken in connection 
with his other attributes, involves the 
idea that all things are not only from 
him but always have been and are now, 
in him. 

His eternity embraces the future as 
well as present. His mind sweeps 
over all, understands all, sustains all, 
regulates all, and unites all in one. 
The successive development of being 
and action which arrest and occupy 
the human mind in the different 
stages of their progress, are a present 
reality to him. Their causation does 
not remove them from that which 
causes; and out of him they must nec- 
essarily cease to be. And thus he is 
constituted by the very elements of 
his nature, the circumference as well 
as the center, the end as well as the 
beginning, the universal all. 

"In Him we live, move and have our 
being."— Acts XVII: 28. 

First. That from a first cause [which 
it is not its business to supply]. The 
universe has developed, by an orderly 
process, into its present condition, for 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



9 



which process it attempts to account. 

■" Wandering oft, with brute unconscious gaze 
Man marks not him — marks not the mighty 
hand, 

That ever being, wheels the silent sphere,— 
And as on earth this grateful change revolves, 

With transport touches all the springs of life*" 

That man does not perceive this, is 
true. And he does not perceive it be- 
cause, trying to see by his own light, 
and not in the Light which God him- 
self is ready to impart, his foolish 
heart is darkened. None can know 
God, in the fullest sense of the term, 
but those who are fully restored to 
him. Separated to a great distance by 
the repulsive power of selfishness, God, 
instead of being universal and the 
ALL, is not only very remote and much 
diminished in appearance, to those 
who are not in harmony with him, but 
even doubtful in existence 

"The fool hath said in his heart 
there is no God.". .Psalms XIV: 1. 

(Notice: "In his heart.'' A great 
many people have said so with their 
mouths and by their philosophy, but 
very few ever, "in their hearts.") 

But it does not follow, because God 
is not known, that he does not exist, 
nor, because he is not realized as eter- 
nal that ho is not eternal. Existence 
does not depend upon perception. 

"The Light shincth in darkness and 
the darkness comprehendeth it not." — 
John I: 5. 

God being the eternity of things is 
the reality. By reality we mean, that 
which is substantial and esential, that 
which is permanent as well as that 
which is just and good: not the shadow 
of the rock (something that depends on 
something other than the rock also) 
but the rock itself; not the reflecting 
of the sun, but the sun itself; the I AM; 
as he names himself, because there is 



no other adequate expression of him, 
the being and not merely the begin- 
ning to be. His eternity envolves his 
essentiality, because we see no reason 
why he should begin to exist, so we see 
no reason why he should begin to 
changs. Unchangeableness is only an 
attribute of eternity. 

Hence; some think the world under 
the law of FATE. But not so, God 
has foreordained effects not causes. 
Men and things are causes after they 
themselves have been caused, and 

"Whatsoever a man soweth that 
shall he also reap."— Galatians VI: 7. 
Not something else as evolution would 
have us think. See also Genesis I: 12. 

Now as our idea of God presents to 
us an occupant for the void of science, 
and an adequate cause for the course 
of things let us turn to his, at least 
purported, record— and any honest 
man can prove its truth by experience 
—for his modis-operandi. 

christo-centricity. 
In the beginning, of all time and 
created existence, was the Logos that 
gave form and being, to all materia. 
Therefore: "before the world was."— 
John XVII-5 and 24, or from all eter- 
nity was this '-Word," this "Logos," 
this "Voice Sound," "God with us,"— 
Mathew 1-2.3. This which was "mani- 
fest in the flesh."— I Timothy 11-16. 
Ths that "became flesh.'.'— John 1-14, 
\vas to God, as man's words and voice 
is to himself, the manifestation, or ex- 
pression of himself to those without 
him. Hence, was "with God."— John 
1-1. As a man's voice is with him— in 
him, and a "flesh" of him. "Was God" 
in nature, substance, essence, power, 
operation. That is the Logos enter- 
ing into flesh, becoming incarnate, be- 
coming flesh,, was but the mode of ex- 



io 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



pression, by which Divinity, transferee!. 
itself from the region of abstraction to 
that of apprehension. This assump- 
tion of the Word— Creative flat — of 
living-, tangible propositions for the 
purpose of revelation and redemption. 
Genesis 1-1 asserts the beginning- and 
origin of all things. John 1-1 announ- 
ces "the beginning." the eternity of 
the Word, and its Divinity. Notice 
here' that to Moses was made known 
God, as an eternal omnipotent, creat- 
ing power, but to John is now revealed 
a personal Divinity.. The nature of 
the Divinity, more clearly shown. 

Moses was taught that God "spake 
and it was done.*' John saw the 
"Voice" incarnate. Note the power 
of the human voice — the magic of tho 
Logas. 

THE HARMONY OF THE RECORDS. 

Compare Genesis 1-1 and 2, and John 
1-1 to 3. 

"And God SAID let there be light," 
—Genesis 1-3. Notice this language 
closely — said. 

"The sublimity of the description in 
the Bible, of the origin of Light, has 
ofteD been lost amid the sneers of the 
infidel and the atheist. "How could 
there be light before the sun?" was 
one of the triumphant questions which 
Voltair and his followers rarely failed 
to press upon the Bible students. But 
the mystery has been receeding as dis- 
covery has advanced. That there may 
be light without the visable sun is now 
admitted; and it is not going farther 
than the facts will warrant to suppose 
that light of old DID thus exist. When 
it was said, "Let there be light," there 
was not so much a new creation as the 
evolution [revelation- Author] of a new 
fact, or rather the presentation of a 
new condition of things in the already 



created heaven and earth. This view 
is sustained by recent influences to 
which observations of the sun has led. 

BLENDING LIGHTS pp. 30 and 40. 

J. W. Dawson, L. L. D.. F. R. S., F. 

G. S., in a work entitled "Nature and 
The Bible" says: "With this flat the 
actual work of reducing old chaos to 
order and life begins, [remember after 
the creation of the world, and nobody 
knows how long, "The earth was with- 
out form and void — void of Life and 
Light — The Author] and begins with 
scientific appropriateness. The He- 
brew word used here for light includes 
the allied forces of heat and electricity^ 
It presents that incomprehensible ether 
which vibrates, and whose vibrations 
are so regulated as to give light with 
its prismatic colors, and heat with all 
its vast powers, and still more strange 
and wonderful actinic power which 
puts in motion all the vital machinery 
of plants, and so is the material force 
of life. If science can anywhere fled a 
stepping-stone to life, it is from th.e 
grossness of atonic matter surely it is 
here." 

."I(thcWoid) am the light of the 
world." — John VIII-12. Light is not 
here confined to luminiforous ether, 
but "Light is whatever makes mani- 
fest. "— Ephesians V-13. 

"The Light shineth in darkness (or 
amid darkness) and the darkness com- 
prehendeth it not."— John 1-5. 

"Light is come into this world and 
men love darkness rather than light, 
because their deeds are evil, but he 
that doeth the truth (truly) cometh to 
the Light"— John 111-19 and 20. 

This refers to the incarnate light. 
The presence of God in the flesh. Of 
his own presence in the world Jesus 
said: "Walk while you have the Light 
lest darkness come upon you." — John 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



U 



XII-35. 

"The people have seen a great 
Light,"— Isaiah IX-2. 

"Arise, shine for thy Light has 
come/'— Isaiah LP-1. This is conced- 
ed to refer to the Christ. 

Not only do we read of the created 
planets, "Let them be for lights in 
the firmament." — Genesis 1-15. (I ap- 
point them to bo lights ill the firma- 
ment) but of the uncreated Logos, 
"Tho Light of thy countenance" — 
IV-5. And of tho future we read: 
"The Light which no man can ap- 
proach unto."— I Timothy VI-1G. And 
of heaven: "The Lamb (a title of hu- 
manity and submission applied to this 
slame Logos) shall bo the light there- 
of."— Revelations XXI-23. "For Cod 
is Light." — I John 1—5. Thus, they 
"need no candle, neither Light of the 
sun; for the Lord God giveth them 
Light." — Revelations XXII-5. So 
much for tho record of Light, past, 
present and future. 

"And God SAID let there be a firm- 
anent." — Genesis 1-7. How did God 
make tho firmanent? "Said." "He 
spake and it was done."— Psalms 
XXXIII-9. "And God said, let the 
waters under the heavens be gathered 
together unto one place, and let tho 
dry land appear; and it was so." "And 
God said, let the Earth bring forth 



grass 



and it was so." "And God 



said let there be lights in the firma- 
ments of the heavens to divide the day 
from the night * * * and it was so." 
"And God said,, let the waters bring 
forth abundantly the moving creatures 
that hath life * * *." And God created 
—not spontaneous generation — great 
whales, &c." "And God said, let the 
earth bring forth living creatures after 
his kind, &c. and it was so." "And 
God made the beasts," "And God said, 



let us make man &c, so God created 
man in his own, imago &c." Tho lan- 
guage here seems peculiar, but we aro 
to remember that Elhoim, the Hebrew 
form, is plural, hence tho necessary 
gramatical connection, but why tho 
plural form of tho Hebrew? To show 
the plurality of His mode of expressing 
himself, probably, as e. g., by sheech, by 
pen, by signs or motions. This language 
may also have reference to our own 
triple nature, of body, mind and spirit, 
— form mind, breath. "And God said, 
behold I have given you every herb 
bearing seed &c, * * * and it was so." 

Nov/, the fact of man's creation was 
this: "And the Lord God formed man 
of the dust of tho ground." The for- 
mation was perfect, God did not leave 
man, if perchance ho might evolve 
himself into life; but He "breathed in- 
to his nostrils the breath of life and 
man became a living soul." 

Of the Logos, John 1-4 says: "In 
him was lifo and the life was the light 
of men." "In whom we have redemp- 
tion through his blood, oven tho for- 
giveness of sins: who is the image of 
the invisible God, the first born of 
every creature? For by Him were all 
things created that arc in heaven, and 
that are in earth, visible and invisible, 
whether thrones or dominions, or prin- 
cipalities or powers. All things were 
created by him and for him. And He 
is before all things and by Him all 
things consist." — Colissians I; 14-17. 

Paul says, in Ephesians III: 8-19: 
"Unto mo who am less than tno least 
of all saints, is this grace that I should 
preach among the Gentiles tho un- 
seorchablo riches of Christ, 

And to make all men see what is the 
fellowship of the mystery, which from 
the beginning of the world hath been 
bid in God, who created all things by 



V2 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



Jesus Christ. (The Word.) 

To the extent that now unto the 
principalities and powers in heavenly 
places might bo known by the church 
the manifold, wisdom of God, according 
to the eternal purpose which he pur- 
posed in Jesus Christ our Lord. 

In whom we have boldness and ac- 
cess with confidence by the faith of 
Him. 

Wherefore I desire that ye faint not 
at my tribulations for you, which is 
your glory. 

For this cause I bow my knee unto 
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
of whom the whole family in heaven 
and earth is named. 

That he would grant ypu according 
to the riches of his glory, to be 
strengthened with might by his spirit 
in the inner man. That Christ may 
dwell in your hearts hj faith; that ye 
being rooted and grounded in Love, 
may be able to comprehend with all 
saints what is the breadth and lenght 
and depth, and height; add to know 
the Love of Christ which passeth know- 
ledge that ye might be filled with all 
the fullness of God." 

"For God who commanded the light 
to shine out of darkness, has shined in- 
to our hearts, to give the light of the 
knowledge of the glory of God in the 
face of Jesus Christ.'' — II Corinthians 
IV: 0. 

The fourth verse says: "The light 
of the glorious gospel of Christ who is 
the image OF GOD should shine unto 
them." 

Jesus is the image of God in the 
same sense that a man's writing is the 
image of the man. They all bear a 
touch of the individuality of the au- 
thor. 

"Beware, lest any man spoil you 
through phylosophy and vain deceipt, 



after the tradition of men, after the 
rudiments of the world, and not after 
Christ. 

"For in HIM dwelleth all the full- 
ness of the God head bodily."— Colos- 
sians II: 8-9. 

Again Paul admonishes his son in 
the gospel. 

"O Timothy, keep that which is 
committed to thy trust, avoiding pro- 
fane and vain babblings, and opposi- 
tions of science, falsely so called: 
which some professing have erred con- 
cerning the faith." — I Timothy VI: 
20-21. 

"God, who at Sunday times and" in 
divers manners spake in times past un- 
to the fathers by the prophets, hath in 
these last days spoken unto us by his 
son [By the bodily form in which he 
manifests himself as the parent is 
manifested in the child. (See Hebrew 
II: 15-16)] whom he hath appointed 
heir of all things, hj whom also he 
made the worlds. 

Who being the brightness of his 
glory, and the express image of his 
person, and upholding all things by 
the 'WORD of his power, when he had 
by himself purged our sins, sat down 
on the right hand of the Majesty on 
high." — Hebrew I 1-3. 

"Every house is builded by some 
man, but ho that built all things is 
God." — Hebrew III: 4. (See Hebrew 
I: 10-12.) 

"God that made the world and all 
things therein * * * Seeing he giveth 
to all life and breath and all things, 
and hath made of one blood, all the 
nations of men for to dwell on all the 
face of the earth, and hath determined 
the times before appointed and the 
bounds of their habitation. That they 
should seek the Lord if haply they 
might feel after Him and find Him. 



IN CREATION AND SUSTENANCE. 



13 



though He be not far from every one 
of us. For in Him we live, and move 
and have our being; as certain also of 
our own poets have said, for we are al- 
so his offering.''— Acts XIV: 24-28. 

"But that God created the universe 
implies not only that he gave a begin- 
ning to its existence but that he con- 
tinues that existence, and that he is 
the only fountain of its present being." 
— McClintock & Strong. 

"For the invisible things of him, 
(God) from the creation of the world 
are clearly seen, being understood by 
the things that are made even his 
eternal power and God-head so that 
they are without excuse." — Romans I: 
20. "Because that which may be 
known of God is manifest in them; for 
God hath showed it unto them. "— vs 19. 

"I will come in and sup with him." 
—Revelations III: 20. 
. "Now if any man hath not the spirit 
of Christ he is nono of his." — Romans 
VIII: 9. 

"He shall be in you,"— John XIV: 
17. (See Gaiatiaiis II: 20 and Romans 
VIII: 10. 

"The ingrafted word (Logos) which 
is able to save your soul." — James 1:21. 

"I am the vino and ye are the 
branches. "—John XV: 5. 

"Abide in mo and I in you. As the 
branch cannot bear fruit of itself, ex- 
cept it abide in the vine no more can 
ye, except yo abide in me." — John XV: 
4. 

"Without me ye can do notning." — 
John Xv: 5. 

Dr. J. W. Etter says: "We may car- 
ry the Christo-centric idea to a wider 
sphere than that of theology; indeed 
to a wider sphere than the world or 
man; we may carry the Christ idea in- 
to the cosmos." 

"AH creation is summed up in 



Christ."— Dean Alford. 

Christ is the pivot of the present on 
which all dternity, past and future 
hangs. He is the keystone of the arch. 
Ho is the light-house of the world. 
The axle of the wheel. 

To banish Christ from the universe 
would be to destroy magnetism [I will 
dray all men. — John XII: 32.] banish 
gravity [for in Him all things consist. ] 
Put out light, destroy truth, and 
abandon the universe to chance. 

He is indeed disallowed by the build- 
ing of materialistic philosophy. 

"But is become the head of the cor- 
ner."— Mark XII: 10. 

"For other foundation can no man 
lay than that is laid, which is Jesus 
Christ." — I Corinthians III: 11. 

It is he who is the "chief corner 
stone," the base upon which all things 
rest and by his pov/er binds each orb 
in its sphere and guides them with his 
eye. 

Oh that he might be made manifest 
in your consciences, that he might at- 
tract you to his side that he might 
electrify you with his love, and lift 
you from the grossness of sensuality 
and selfishness, by the magnetism of 
his cross, and light in you the lamp of 
hope, by, the match of faith which by 
prayer may bo kindled at the fires of 
heaven. This world can never be ex- 
plained without the aid of another, nor 
can its mysteries be solved without the 
introduction of another. 

Therefore, to Him who "hath done 
all things well," let us ascribe praise 
and thanksgiving. 

"Ye curious minds, who roam abroad, 
And trace creation's wonders o'er; 

Confess the footprints of your God, 
And bow before Him, and adore." 



14 



CHRIST, A BASAL TRUTH, 



"The Heavens declare Thy glory, Lord, 

In ever^' star Thy wisdom shines; 
But when our eyes behold Thy Word, 

We read Thy name in fairer lines." 

"Arise, O Lord, and in Thy matchless strength, 

Assunder rend the links my heart that bind, 
And liberate, and raise, and save at length 

My long enthralled and subjugated mind. 
Oh, send one ray into my sightless ball, 

Transmit one beam into my darkened heart! 
On Thee, Almighty God, on Thee I call, 

Incline Thy listening ear, Thine aid impart! 
In vain the natural sun his beams doth yield, 

In vain the moon illumes the fields of air; 
The eye-sight of my soul is quenched and seal- 
ed, 

And what is other light if shades are there? 
Beyond the sun and moon I lift my gaze, 



Where round Thy throne a purer light is 
spread, 
Where seraphs fill their urns for that bright 
blaze, 
And angels* souls with holy fires are fed. 
Oh, send from that pure fount one quickening 
ray, 

And change these inward shades to bright 
and glorious day! 
And then, with strength and beauty in her 
wings, 
My quickened soul shall take an upward 
flight, 
And in Thy blissful presence, King of kings, 

Rejoice in liberty, and life, and light, 
In renovated power and conscious truth, 
In faith and cheerful hope, in love and endless 
vouth." 



SMsl Ifce HiraglB Worigr, 



"This man doeth many miracles."— 
John xi-47. 

Our subject is no sooner named than 
skepticism cries out, "away with your 
stale miracles, give us something 
fresh." Freshness is not, however, a 
virtue in everything. The freshness 
of the skeptic often brings him into 
contact with elements that soon make 
both he and his objections stale, [truth.] 
No amount of ridicule, iho' there is 
much of it, will blot Bull Run out of 
American history, nor will m English 
disdain reverse the victory of Oliver 
Hazzard Perry; no more will your jests 
efface Christ's miracles. 

As men we must meet in the royal 
mart of reason and weigh the subjects 
with their attendant evidence, in the 
balance of truth. This we shall at- 
tempt. Mark the arguments, pro and 
con. 

THE HISTORIC CHRIST. 

The myth theory has been hooted 
out of the camp of intelligence, because 
it would disprove all history, no matter 
how modern. Arch Bishop Whately 
in his "Historic Doubts" showed that 
the reasoning that disproved Christ 
would disprove the existance of Napo- 
leon. 

That Christ was a historic person 
and lived as a man among men, as the 



ancient wariors and phylosophers re- 
ceives the credence of all candid people. 

He (Jesus Christ) is not to be ac- 
counted for by any spiritual darwinism, 
by any possible process of development. 
Do what you will with his character, 
you cannot bring him into line with his 
predecessors, whether Jewish or Gen- 
tile, or with the culture or standard of 
his age. These eighteen centuries of 
progress have not brought the advanced 
guard of humanity up to him. We can 
trace the rudinents of their pre-emi- 
nent characters, and show whence and 
how they grew. There is no human or 
earthly accounting for him. The char- 
acter of Christ portrayed in the gospels 
is the highest possible evidence of their 
authenticity. It is a character which 
without an original could not have been 
conceived by the evangelists; one for 
which they had neither the materials 
within their reach, nor the genius or 
culture requisite for its invention. As 
an actual character it could not possi- 
bly have been formed by anticedent or 
surrounding influences. It was not a 
natural development: for human virtue 
was not yet developed up to its stand- 
ard. 

"Its human side cannot possibly be 
authentic unless its divine side is equal- 
ly authentic."— Dr. Peabody, in 30,000 



1(1 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



thoughts. Vol. 1. pp. 129 and 130. 

What the enemies of Christ have 
failed to do by open hostility (the Myth 
theory' they hope to accomplish by 
pretended friendship. Pat to shame 
by their own logic they confess the 
historic Christ. 

The Savior lived. He was very pure, 
wise and good, but he was divine oniy 
as anyone is divine, who is good. As 
they stop to praise philosophers, the 
intelligent person asks: '•What of 
Christ?" "Oh he was a great teacher." 
Let us all believe in him but don't let 
us believe too much in him. 

But they forget that it is the same 
authority that gives us the historic 
Christ, that gives us his miracles etc. 
They fail to show us why we should be- 
lieve the historian in the one case and 
discredit him in the other, why he 
should be credited concernig the fact 
of the. person of Christ, why we should 
believe him when he says Jesus was 
born in Bethlehem and crucified on 
Calvery: and discredit him when he 
says he stopped a funeral procession of 
"Nam/" raised Lazerus from the dead, 
healed Peter's mother-in-law, restored 
the daughter of Jarius. or arose from 
the grave; why we should credit that 
he quotes from other ages and discred- 
it that he had seen with his own eyes, 
heard with his own ears and handled 
with his own hands. 

Those who try to exclude the divin- 
ity and yet extol the peksox of Christ, 
forget that Christ stands upon a rock 
of testsmony. Testimony of the ages 
preceeding his coming, the testimony 
of his friends, his own testimony and 
the testimony of his enemies. 

An objector has conceded too much 
when he concedes the person of Christ, 
or an historic Christ, for the safety of 
his position, because the supernatural. 



the miraculous Christ rests upon the 
same evidence; and he rejects too much 
when he rejects the person of Christ 
for the same logic rejects all testi- 
mony. Take either horn of the dilem- 
ma you choose and you must take a 
great many things that an anti-super- 
natural hypothssi: can never endure. 

The prophetic Christ was not merely 
a human Christ. He was not aPharoah. 
a Moses or a Cyrus. He was to be mir- 
aculous in his conception, birth, youth, 
and manhood. Miraculous in his dee'ds 
but still more so in his character. 

Destroy the prophesies of a super- 
natural Christ, and we have no re- 
deemer, there is ao Christ in the old 
testament. No one questions the his- 
tory cf the manger birth. We can 
readily see how the Wonderful Coun- 
celor, the Great Teacher, has fulfilled 
the proplitic words of his coming. That 
he was despised and rejected of men, 
denied, stricken, smitten of God and 
affiicted of God, is obvious. 

These things are more than occur- 
rances. 

* "Prepare ye the way of the Lord." 
John said: "I am a messenger sent to 
prepare the way before him," to "make 
his path straight." It was at this pe- 
culiar period that Jesus, the Lamb of 
God. appeared. The theory that he 
was a good man is obviously false. He 
was God or he was a deceiver, for . he 
testifies "I and my father are one" "no 
man has seen the father at any time: 
but the Son, he hath declared him'.' r 
"I cast out devils by the spirit of God: 
believe the works that I do that ye 
may know and believe that I am in the 
Father and he in me." He declared 
himself. "Word, Truth and Life," and 
stated that he came "down out of heav- 
en." He adopted and applied the 
prophesies of a Savior to himself, he 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



accepted the wonderful story of his 
birth, a story as miraculous as that the 
dead should live again. If this story 
is to be discredited, then all in the Gos- 
pels must go with it. His enemies tes- 
tify, "this man doeth many miracles." 
In those days they tried to kill him be- 
cause he worked miracles, and set 
about to charge and prove this of him; 
and now they having learned that this 
was the confirmation of his divinity set 
about to kill him by a disproof of his 
miracles. No fact is more thoroughly 
established in human history than that 
Christ was a miracle worker. 

Infidelity and Uuitarianism (an infi- 
del wolf in religious garb) must either 
disprove the fact of Christ altogether 
or accept him as that he claimed to be. 
"God with us"— Matthew 1-23. 

The charge that secured the execu- 
tion of Jesus was "This man doeth 
many miracles.* * * If we let him alone 
all men will believe on him, and the 
Romans will come and take away both 
our place and our notion." 

Miracles are come to be termed the 
burden instead of the bulwark of the 
Gospel. 

MIRACLES DEFINED. 

A very great amount of our trouble 
about miracles grows out of an insuffi- 
cient definition of what constitutes a 
miracle. A miracle is not as Hume and 
other objectors have defined it to be, 
"contrary to the course of nature" or 
"against nature," but miracles are 
signs or wonders done as evidence or 
assurance of the presence of more than 
ordinary agencies — that is, the action 
of a powerful agent not before under- 
stood by us, in so much that we are 
made to marvel. Not contrary to our 
experience but superior to it. Dr. Mac- 
Donald says, in "Miracles Of Our 
Lord," pages 11 and 12: "If he came to 



reveal his Father in minature, as it 
were (for in these unspeakable things 
we can but use figures, and the homli- 
est may be the holiest) to tone down 
his great voice, which, too loud for 
men to hear it aright, could but sound 
to them as an inarticulate thunder — 
into such a still small voice as might 
enter their human ears in welcome hu- 
man speech, then the works that his 
father does so widely, so grandly that 
they transcend the vision of men. The 
Son must do briefly and sharply before 
their very eyes." 

This, I think, is the true nature of . 
the miracles, an epitome of God's pro- 
cesses in nature beheld in immediate 
connection with their source— a source 
as yet lost to the eyes, and too often to 
the hearts of men in the far reaching 
gradations of continuous law. That 
men might see the will of God at work. 
Jesus did the work c! his Father thus." 
"Rev. J. M. Gibson, D.D. says: "It is 
important to remember that in this dis- 
cussion it is not necessary to give a 
scientific definition of miracle. It is 
enough to know that Christ put forth 
superhuman power. It is of no conse- 
quence whether he used for the pur- 
pose some physical agency unknown to 
man, or whether he produced the effect 
by direct volition without the interven- 
tion of any occult agency, whether 
physical or spiritual. All that is es- 
sential, the saperhuman power mani- 
fested in the result. It would tend 
very much to simplify this whole dis- 
cussion, if, instead of attempting to de- 
fend some particular notion, we may 
have of the interior nature of a miracle, 
we would be content with the simple 
way in which Christ himself put it 
when he said: "If I had not done among 
them the works, that no other man did, 
they had not had sin. " The fact is, that 



18 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



many of the arguments supposed to be 
against miricles are only against cer- 
tain definitions of a miracle." 

That Dr. Gibson is correct in his 
final statement is quite plain from the 
following. Rev. G. P. Fsher, D.D., L. 
L.D., or, in the briefer phrase of Pas- 
cal, "a miracle is an event exceeding 
the natural power of the means employ- 
ed." This definition is insufficient, be- 
cause the natural power of God is a 
miracle, and when divinity is the agen- 
cy miracle is sure to be the consequence. 
I most assuredly hold that the universe 
is governed by law— rather operates ac- 
cording to law— and that what to us is 
mirculous (out of the ordinary course 
of things) is but an intervention or op- 
eration of a higher law of either na- 
ture or personality or both. When I 
say nature, and that nothing can be 
done against nature, I mean the nature 
of God. The present course of things 
being only a dim exemplification of, by 
reason of the dullness of our vision. 

Olinthis Gregory, L. L. D., F. R. A. 
S., says: "By miracles I do not mean 
juggling tricks, but supernatual events. 
This genuine notion of miracles has 
been sometimes obscured by definition: 
yet a candid inquirer after truth can- 
not well mistake. Most of the opinions 
entertained by men of good sense, apart 
from any controversial views as to this 
topic, are correct. No man would think 
that curing lameness by a regular sur- 
gical or medical process was miracu- 
lous. Every man would say that the 
instantaneous production of a limb, and 
making the maimed whole, was mirac- 
ulous. And this exactly reaches the 
logical scientific notion of miracles, for, 
when such effects are produced as [cae- 
teris paribus] are usually produced, 
God is said to operate according to the 
common course of nature: but when 



such effects are produced as are (caet. 
par) different from, that common course 
of nature they are said to be miracu- 
lous." 

[Pierson's Infalible proofs] "A mira- 
cle in scripture sense, is simply this: 

A "WONDER AND A SIGN. Its sole USe 

is that God appeals to it as a sign of 
his power. * * * It need not be on the 
grandest scale, it need not call God's 
power into its fullest exercise: that 
might be a waste. All that is neces- 
sary is that the act or occurance shall 
be sufficiently wonderful to show that 
God ? s hand is in it, and its end is ac- 
complished." A miracle must com- 
bine two elements, wonder and sign. 
Any occurence having either of these 
elements without the other could not 
be a miracle. Hence: the rainbow is a 
sign, but easily explicable. The lunar 
influence on the tide is wonderful, tho* 
may not be considered as a sign, or 
warning; hence; neither are miracles. 
That white is a compound of all the 
radical colors is wonderful, but not mir- 
aculous and that light passed through 
a prism is separated into seven colors, 
causes us to wonder, but we do not 
think of it as a miracle. 

Mr. Bowers says of miracles: "They 
have been well compared to the tolling 
of the bell to summon people to 
church." 

So miracles were designed to call at- 
tention to the voice of God, speaking 
on some unusually solemn occasion, as 
at the opening of the new dispensation.. 

REASONABLENESS OF THE BIBLE REC- 
ORD OF MIRACLES. 

"Jesus of Nazereth, a man approved 
of God, among you by MIRACLES, 
and wonders and signs, which God did 
by him in the midst of you as ye your- 
selves also know." — Acts 2:22. 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



19 



A NECESSARY HYPOTHESIS. 

There are but "four" hypotheses that 
can be assumed with respect to the 
miracles of Jesus Christ, one or other of 
which a reasonable being must adopt. 

First: The recorded accounts of these 
miracles are absolute fiction, wickedly 
and viciously perpetrated by some one 
for the purpose of deceiving humanity, 
or, 

Second: Jesus did not work any true 
miracles, but the people were in some 
way or another deceived and deluded 
into the belief that he wrought mira- 
cles, or, 

Third: The spectators were not de- 
ceived, but actually knew that Jesus 
wrought no miracles: yet nevertheless 
they — friend and foe, Jew and Gentile — 
went into the most celebrated combine 
of all ages, to pursuade the world that 
He whom they "continually sought to 
kill," did perforin "among them the 
works that none other did." So, while 
some told the story of mighty works, 
others kept silent, and never betrayed 
the fraud, but managed the matter with 
such dexterity and mutual harmony, 
that the story of miracles should not 
only become current, but well nigh un- 
iversal, and so shaded that no person 
could shake its credibility; or, 

Fourth: That Jesus was really a 
"teacher sent from God" a "Revelation 
of the Father, ' ' approved ' 'by miracles" 
and that the Bible account is sub- 
stantially correct. 

If you conclude to reject the last of 
these conclusions it is of no difference 
which one of the others you adopt. 

FOURTH HYPOTHESIS REASONABLE. 

To an individual who believes in a 
personal God, who may for good reas- 
ons interfere with the ordinary process 



if things, miracles are small obstacles, 
of obstacles at all, but the Deist, Panthe- 
ist and Atheist MUST deny the possi- 
bility of miracles. 

Something may be gained by 
examining the cause for these great 
works, and the remuneration received. 
Jesus always performed miracles of 
helpfulness. It was strength for impo- 
tent feet; brawn for a withered arm: 
sight for blind eyes; food for the hun- 
gry thousands; restoration for a demo- 
niac; health for a fever, a palsy or lep- 
rosy; life to a dead son, or brother or 
daughter: "without money and with- 
out price." 

The only miracle in which there was 
a money consideration was one of wis- 
dom, when Peter was told how to catch 
a fish that had money in its mouth, and 
pay ' 'Poll Tax" for ' 'They T wain". It 
was evidently not a matter of wealth: 
nor was it for power, for when the peo- 
ple would have made him king he refus- 
ed. Miracles have been the order of the 
day ever- since the creation. They 
were Christ's credentials — "By their 
fruits ye shall know them," — It was 
thus spoken by the prophets. 

"All of nature's operations are mar- 
velous but not miraculous, for they are 
more in the line of fixed law. Man 
represents intelligent, intellectual 
force; all man's operations are marvel- 
ous but not miraculous, for they move 
in the line of fixed laws — laws of mind 
as well as matter. If there is a miracle 
at all it must invade the fixed order."— 
Dr. Pierson. 

The one great object of Christ and 
his apostles in doing miracles was to 
furnish awakening and convincing 
proof of their mission. 

See Matt. 9, 18-24, Matt. 11, 3, 4, 5, 
Jno. 3. 2; 5. 3(5; 10. 24, 25, 37, 38; 11. 47, 



•20 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKE&. 



48; 15. 24, of the apostles it is said "God 
also bare them witness, both with signs 
and wonders, and with divers miracles, 
and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according 
to his own will." — Heb. 2. 4. 

Early christian writers when they 
did not assume the History as true,' ap- 
pealed most emphatically to the mira- 
cles. Quadratus, Justin Martyr, 
Irenseus, Lactantius, Tertulian, Origen, 
Augustin and Jerome are examples in 
point. 

The early opponents of Christianity 
did not deny miracles. Read, Heiro- 
cles, Porphyry, Lucian. Celsus and Je- 
rome try to ridicule the thought and 
practice of so much stir about those 
things but do not deny them. 

Mr. Cunningham asks: ' "Whether 
modern infidels who have ventured to 
contradict the miracles of Christ, a 
weapon Celsus was afraid to take up,' 
have estimated the rashness of their 
enterpriser 1 Are they competent to 
deny what a spectator no less malevo- 
lent than themselves was compelled to 
admit? Has the lapse of 1800 years en- 
abled them to ascertain a fact of daily 
occurance with more accuracy than a 
by-sfcander? Are objects best seen at 
the greatest distance'?" 

It was upon belief in miracles, that 
induced men of rank to follow the "Low- 
ly Nazerene." Nicodemus, said: "Xo 
man can do these miracles which 
thou doest, except God be with him."' 
"Raboni, we know that thou art a 
teacher come from God." The testi- 
mony of The Man Born Blind was 
"whereas I was blind. NOW I see.*' 

OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED. 

First: Those dissenting to the fact of 
miracles will tell you "that no miracles 
are now performed, and hence never 
were." 



This is obviously a false position. On 
this hypothesis a blind man could say: 
"I never saw light, therefore there is 
no light," or an eclipse of the sun — to- 
tal eclipse — I have never seen. The 
sun does not now [in the range of my 
personal experience] have total eclipses, 
and therefore on Mr. Voltaires hypoth- 
esis never had such. 

Eclipse would not be necessarily con- 
trary to my experience, because I have 
no experience of this kind, it would on- 
ly be a new experience. The next ob- 
jection is that miracles are only "slight 
of hand" or "some character of decep- 
tion.'' The persons who testify may be 
honest but mistaken. "They were ig- 
norant and therefore easily misled." 

These objections are all of tho same 
kind or class and answered with the 
same arguments. Can five thousand 
hungry persons at one time and place. 
and four thousand at another time and 
place — people who have been all day in 
a desert without food — be juggled into 
the belief that they have had their 
supper, and walk five or six miles to 
their homes, and never discover the 
falsity? Impossible! Can a man who' 
never saw the light of day be juggled 
into eyesight? Can a whole commun- 
ity as well as the lepers be mace to be- 
lieve that these lepers arc cleansed, 
and take them into society again? -Yet 
these are the facts connected with the 
miracles of Jesus. John the Baptist 
sent two of his disciples of Jesus to in- 
quire, "art thou he that should come or 
look we for another?" 

And in that same hour he [Jesus] 
cured many of their infirmities and 
plagues and of evil spirits: and unto 
many that were blind gave he sight. 

"Then Jesus answering said unto 
them, go your way, and fell John what 



■CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



21 



things ye have seen and heard; how 
that the blind see, the lame walk, the 
lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the 
dead are raised, to the poor the gospel 
is preached."— Luke vn: 20-22. Was 
Luke ignorant, or was Paul? Was 
Mcodemus and the Pharisees unlearn- 
ed? The perpetration of such gigan- 
tic fraud, if fraud it might be, would be 
a miracle in itself. Mr. Hume however 
would argue thus: "Experience, which 
in some things is variable, in others is 
uniform, is our only guide in reasoning 
concerning matters of fact. Variable ex- 
perience gives rise to probabilities on- 
ly: a uniform experience amounts to 
proof. Our belief of any fact, from the 
testimony of eye witnesses is derived 
from no other principle than our ex- 
perience of the veracity of human tes- 
timony. If the fact attested is mirac- 
ulous there is a contest of two opposite 
experiences, or proof against proof. 

"Now, a miracle is a violation of the 
laws of nature; and as a firm and un- 
alterable experience has established 
these laws, the proof against a miracle 
from the very nature of the fact, is as 
complete as any argument from exper- 
ience can possibly be imagined; and if 
so it is an undeniable consequence that 
it cannot be surmounted by any proof 
whatever, derived from human testi- 
mony." — Encyclopedia Britanica. 

Mr. Hume further argues: "Nature's 
laws are uniform; miracles imply a vio- 
lation of that uniformity — it is easier to 
believe a hundred' men, honest but 
mistaken, than to believe one such ab- 
surdity to be possible." A knowledge 
of Hume's philosophy and theology 
will make his position on miracles seen 
to be necessary. Hume was a deist, he 
traced all of nature's phenomena to 
uniform causes, and made the fact of 
phenomena— or rather its admission- 



depend upon his powor to account for 
the cause. So nothing could be thought 
to occur that would be out of the order 
of nature for there would be no way to 
restore the universe to a normal con- 
dition again. But further, Hume's 
first error lies in the statement that a 
"miracle is contrary to nature" or the 
xaws of nature. Second; That a firm 
and unalterable experience has estab- 
lished these laws. Third; That a un- 
iform experience amounts to a proof. 
Fourth; That our belief in a fact from 
eye witnesses depends on our experi- 
ence of the veracity of human testi- 
mony. Fifth; That experience is our 
ONLY guide in reasoning concerning 
matters of fact. Sixth; That it is easi- 
er to disbelieve a hundred men whom 
you believe honest, than to believe 
your experience could be different to 
that it has been. 

Tho' the sophistries of skepticism 
have been often answered, we shall in 
our own way attempt to reveal the sub- 
tle dishonesty of Deistic and Atheistic 
Philosophy. 

First; Are miracles contrary to the 
laws of nature? To answer that "they 
are," you must not only know some of 
the laws of nature, but all of its laws. 
What do we really know (experiment- 
ally) of universal law? 

May not a miracle be affected by 
bringing a higher law into action, the 
law of will? However, miracle must 
imply Gocl in immediate action. 

We get lost when we begin to philos- 
ophize and define. The law there may 
be in the case, is so far from removing 
God from the sequence, that it brings 
him directly into it. I think the fol- 
lowing to be the order of miracles so 
far as law applies in the case, and the 
Book itself calls attention to such prob- 
ability. See Romans 1-20. 



CHRIST. THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



A needle lies on my desk-, a force 
known as gravity or weight holds it 
motionless. A magnet is held above 
the needle, and it at once leaves the 
table for the magnet. Has there 
been any violation of law'? No. Gravity 
still acts. What has occurred? A 
stronger law has been introduced. I 
now separate the needle and magnet. 
Has any law been violated? No. The 
.higher law of my will, my free agency, 
has been introduced. 

This it the exact law of miracles. By 
the introduction of the divine person- 
ality, we have the operation of a higher 
law than tlie usual rule governing Phe- 
nomena. 

Second; '"That a linn unalterable ex- 
perience has established these laws." * 
First "we would ask how much experi- 
ence' will it require to be a law? What 
must be the length of our experience, 
and how do we know that our experi- 
ence is at all like the experience of any 
other age? Indeed, in some ways it is 
not like such. What laws are refered 
to by "these laws"? Surely all the laws 
governing the universe should be in- 
cluded. Who knows such range or 
breadth? 

Prof. Prichard says: "Our ignorance 
or limited knowledge of the vast range 
of the universe, of the relation: of mind 
and will to material instruments, ren- 
ders it presumptuous to regard mira- 
cles as contrary to those laws of nature 
which may include them." 

I shall ask you this, to consider with 
me the vastness of nature — a vastness 
both with regard to variety and ex- 
tent — to our finite conception a vast- 
ness illimitable, infinite. And the rea- 
son why I invite you to the consider- 
ation of this phase of nature lies in the 
conviction that it will remove from 



some minds, as it certainly has from 
my own, all a priori or anterior objec- 
tions to the miracles of the New Testa- 
ment, drawn from the suspicion that 
they are contrary to the laws of na- 
ture. "' 

What shall be called a uniform ex- 
perience? 

Rowlinson says: "Shall we say all 
experience and analogy is against mir- 
acles? But this is either to judge from 
our own narrow and limited experience 
of the whole course of nature, and so 
to generalize upon the most weak and 
insufficient grounds, or else, if in the 
phrase 'ail experience' we include the 
experience of others, it is to draw a 
conclusion directly in the teeth of our 
data: for many persons, well worthy of 
belief, have declared that they have 
witnessed and wrought Miracles." . 

Abricombic's Mental Philosophy p 
61) speaks of a certain king of an island 
who had been told many things- of 
other lands and believed them, but 
when the man whom he had believed 
in other things told him that water 
would become so hard that a man could 
walk upon it. thrust him away as a fal- 
sifier. His experience was uniform: 
the experience of his ancestry also, no 
doubt, but their experience was too 
limited and their ignorance can never 
stand as a disproof of so potent a truth- 
as that water will freeze. In our time 
it may be that no miracles are wrought 
but these things are not sufficient for a 
disproof from the following consider- 
ations. 

An African is procured in the heath- 
en state. He knows little, if anything, 
of civilized customs. He is told of our 
civilization, society and inventions. He 
knows no government save a tribe. We 
tell him of a republic, and to all these 



CHRIST, THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



23T. 



things he must say from the view point 
of Mr. Hume, "Impossible. It is con- 
trary to my uniform experience and 
hence can not be. The poor black man 
thinks so, but he is mistaken."' Do you 
also see that it would further destroy 
the utility of all discovery and inven- 
tion of an advanced type. 

Then further, this is an unsafe posi- 
tion, for what knowledge have I of the - 
parts of the world by experience? I 
am compelled to accept testimony. 
Then what do I know of the past? 
What do I know of the experience of 
my ancestors? Even the experience of 
Mr. Hume, save by testimony? 

Fourth— These ingenius skeptics 
think to preclude all difficulties of logic 
by making faith an impossibility, by 
making experience first necessary. 
But this is the reverse order of every- 
thing. The infant child knows noth- 
ing save by "that mysterious intui- 
tion.'* It believes testimony, and be- 
lieves, unavoidably, all told it for truth 
until experience has taught it that un- 
truths are told. However, its belief 
antidates any experience of "the vera- 
city of human testimony/' 



Dr. A. T. Pierson says: 



•When a 



man voluntarily assumes a position like 
this in order to make all argument im- 
possible, there is no more hope of con- 
vincing him of the truth than of ex- 
panding or dialating the pupil of the 
• eye by pouring more light upon it." 

Bigotry, whether in believers or un- 
believers, hates light, and grows nar- 
rower and more contracted as the light 
increases in intensity. But for the sake 
of candid minds in danger of being mis- 
lead by plausible sophistry, let us ex- 
amine this infidel position. This ' 'im- 
possible" is the "papal bull" of skepti- 
cism. I object to mere dogmatism. So 
does the skeptic — when" used by the 



other fellow. 

Fifth— "Experience our ONLY guide 
in reasoning concerning matters of 
fact." This is one of the most palpa- 
ble of all errors. How, from experi- 
ence, can the heathen reason of civiliz- 
tian? The primitive Indians of this- 
country reason of horticulture and agri- 
culture. From this data tell us how 
the Esquimo is to reason out the con- 
stant summer of the torrid zone, when 
his experience — uniform experience — is 
winter. 

Our range of experience is so narrow- 
that it is the 1 per cent of our knowl- 
edge, while the 99 per cent is the ex- 
perience of the remainder of the world. 

Sixth — It is easier to believe one 
hundred men honest but mistaken, etc. 
You could not make such a statement 
stand before any bar of intelligence.. 
The testimony of 100 reputable men 
will convince any reasonable man. 
There will not be a reasonable doubt 
left him, though they have hitherto- 
had no experience on the subject, and 
though you can not understand the mat- 
ter in question. Shall I call ail scien- 
tists fools because my mind is dull and 
experience brief? Shall I reject all 
science because I don't understand it, 
because I have not "experienced" it? 
Religion is the science of the invisable 
world. Shall I call millions liars be- 
cause I have not ascertained the truth? 
Shall all the world become liars rather 
than my philosophy fail? Is the skep- 
tic more honest than other men? Let 
facts, not theory, answer. One hundred 
men tell me they used to plow with a 
crooked stick. 

It is contrary (different) to anything in 
my experience. Is my experience a^ 
disproof of their testimony? Or 10O 
men testify to the heathen of ships, 
railroads, factories, implements, etc 



CHRIST. THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



It is contrary to their experience. 
Shall that disprove the fact of the 
thing's? No more can your ignorance 
or your cavil disprove miracles. 

Hume himself admits "that there 
may be miracles of such a kind as to 
admit cf proof from human testimony, 
and be received by philosophers as cer- 
tain." Though he had slid "no kind 
of testimony for any kind of miracle 
can possibly amount to a probability, 
much less a proof." And yet these men 
plead for consistency and howl discrep- 
ancy. 



THE RESURRECTION. 

THE MOST STUPENDOUS MIRACLE OF 
THE AGE. 

This is the Gettysburg, the Corinth 
the Waterloo, the Marathon, the Ther- 
mopylae of the Christian conflict. 

If this position prove pregnable, then 
there is no impregnable position in the 
christian system, and Christianity 
must soon become a mythological relic. 

Nothing needs be stated to you of 
the crucifixion cf Jesus, it is so well 
known as to have become common and 
therefore unappreciated by most of us. 

There can be no question as to his 
death and burial. The rock and the 
seal secured by the Roman guard make 
a mistake as to this matter impossible. 

CHRIST'S OWN PROPHECY. 

His own prophecy was that he should 
lay three days in the grave. 
nNow the Bible history is this: Friday- 
he was buried — hence Friday in the 
tomb, one day; Saturday, two days 
(Jewish Sabbath) and Sunday, the first 
day of the week, the third day after 
the burial, certain women went to em- 
balm the body, and the body was gone. 
Now three things alone are possible. 

First — That the enemies of Jesus had 



his body. Now the enemies were the 
many and the friends were the few. 
The enemies have never been accused 
with such theft, however. This would 
be of no advantage to them. Their ad- 
vantage lay in seeing that he remained 
in the Arimathian's tomb. This they 
took great care to do. but the women 
find that "he is not here." 

Second — That his friends took the 
body. This was impossible, because 
they were few and unarmed. Soldiers 
guarded the grave. They would- not 
dare break the Roman seal. It could 
have availed them nothing but- doubt 
to have the body — it would have been 
a disproof. The disciples preached a 
resurection. saying: "The Lord is 
risen indeed."' Now the enemies say: 
"While we slept." which means that 
they were unconscious and had futher 
incurred the penalty cf death — "his dis- 
ciples came and stole him away.'" 

Did you ever hear of anyone being- 
shot for sleeping at the grave? 'Did 
you ever hear of anyone being pun- 
ished for breaking the seal? This evi- 
- deuce is self-ccndemnatcry by reason 
of its own absurdities. 

The proper and natural conclusion is 
"that He is risen as He said." 
His personal appearance would be good 
testimony. Strangers would have no 
way of recognizing him. His appear- 
ance to his foes would have been un- 
natural, hence he manifests himself to 
his acquaintances for forty days in 
bodily form and for 18C0 years in away 
no less assuredly known. 

Appearances of Christ after his res- 
urection: (1) to Mary Magdalene, early 
Sunday morning (John xx 11-17: Mark 
xvi 9 ): (2) soon after, to the women re- 
turning from the sepulcher Matt 
xxviii 9. 10); (3) to Peter, the same 
moraino-, near the citv (Luke xxiv 34 : 



CHRIST. THE MIRACLE WORKER. 



(.4) to the two disciples on their way to 
}£mm,aus, in the afternoon of the same 
da^ 7 ((Luke xxiv 13), to the disciples 
Jexc.ep,ting Thomas) the same evening 
at Jerusalem (Jno. xx 19); (C) to the dis- 
piples including Thomas, at Jerusalem, 
pn the. evening of the next Sunday 
(JTi^q- xx 2G r 29j; (7) to the seven disci- 
ples at the Sea of Galilee, as they were 
fishing (Jno. xxi 1), (8) to the eleven 
disciples on a mountain in Galilee 
(Matt, xxviii 16); (9) to above five hun- 
dred brethren at once* in Galilee (1 Cor. 
xv:G'; (10) to James alpnc, (1 Cor. xv 7); 
(11) to the whole company, of? the apos- 
tles, on the Mount of Olives, at his as- 
cension, the fortieth day after his res- 
umption; (12) to Paul, on the road to 
Damascus (Acts ix 3-7). 

1 am gratified to know that the testi- 
mony of the resurrection docs not rest 
on the history of only forty days. 

I consider these appearances the 
minor part of the testimony to a living- 
Jesus at this time. We are quite sure 
that without a risen Chrtst our faith 
and preaching would be vain. But 
there is no room for doubt here. Thir- 
teen million living believers are not 
only witness to the fact Christ WAS, 
but is alive today. 

Every church building and every 
church organization are witnesses of a 
living Christ. So also is every mis- 
sionary, every Sunday school, every 
Christian Endeavor, every Bible, every 
hymn book, theological seminary, 
every public school, every civilized 
community. Nor are these all. Every 
one of the sainted dead who have left 
glorious testimony. Every martyr for 
his namesake. Every convent from the 
Penticot to* the present. 

But still there is other evidence, The 
enemies of Christ testily. 



Infidelity is today a witness to a liv- 
ing Christ. Who ever thought of fight- 
ing a dead man? Whoever heard of 
fighting a dead (powerless) faith? Ah! 
it is because there is life, resurrection. 
Life and power that puts to shame 
their weakness, that arouses their ire. 

We shall be contented with this brief 
summary of facts without philosophy 
or embeiishment. 

' 'Now is Christ risen from the dead 
and beccme the first fruits of them that 
slept," and has answered the question 
asked from the days of Job: "If a man 
die shall he live again?" and announces 
to the world, "I am the resurection 
and the life." "If a man believe in me 
though he were dead, yet shall he live 
again, and if a man live and believe in 
me he shall never die.'' Christ's 
egress from the tomb has put a differ- 
ent phase on human life. 

It is told of Michael Angelo on ex- 
amining the work of one of his students, 
betook his pencil and wrote "amplius— 
wide." This breaking of the bands of 
death and conquoring the Tomb has 
written "Amplius" upon our canopy as 
our star of hope, for it has added etern- 
ity to time. 

"Vain the stone, the watch, the seal, 
Christ hath burst the gates of hell, 
Death in vain forbade him rise, 
Christ hath opened paradise." 

Says Rev. Dr. Tholock, would you 
with a piece of rock prevent his egress 
from the night of the grave into the 
twilight of the day? Sooner may you 
roll a stone against the eastern 
heavens, that the morning sun should 
not rise out of the grave of the night, 
than the gravestone of the Prince of 
Life should prevent his coming forth to 
the light of day." 

How the resurection of Christ has 
chano-ed the whole thought of death. 



26 



CHRIST. THE MIRACLE WORKER, 



In the words of Mizzini, Itly's noblest 
patriot: "Christ came * * * He 
bent over the corpse of the dead world 
and whispered a word of faith. Over 
the clay that had lost all of man but 
the movement and the form, he uttered 
words until then unknown, love, sacri- 
fice, a heavenly origin. And the dead 
arose. From that corpse arose the 
Christian world — the world of liberty 
and equality. From that clay arose the 
true man, the image of God, the pre- 
cursor of humanity." 

This is what Hugo, in his closing 
years, wrote, as the very inmost 
expression of his heart and brain and 
soul, on the great subject of the here- 
after: "I feel in myself the future 
life. I am like a forest which has been 
more than once cut down. I am rising, 
I know, toward the sky. The sunshine 
is on. my head. The earth gives me its 
generous sap, but heaven lights me 
with the reflection of unknown worlds. 
You say the soul is nothing but the re- 
sultant of bodily powers. Why, then, 
is my soul more luminous when my 
bodily powers begin to fail? Winter is 
on my head and eternal spring is in my 
heart. Then I breathe at this hour 
the eternal fragrance of the lilacs, the 
violets and the roses as at twenty 
years. The nearer I approach the end 
the plainer I hear around me the im- 
mortal symphonies of the worlds which 
invite me." 

Shall not he who made the clock of 
the heavens exercise the same authori- 
ty over it that you afreet upon your 
pocket piece? 

Shall the dropping of this charnal 
house in hopeless ruin to the ground be 
any cause for thinking the inhabitant 
dead? Is it so of rented houses? This 
bodes is our house — rented house — only 
to be used while we stay here. We are 



soon to move, for we have no continu- 
ing city, move to our eternal dwelling- 
place beyond death's dingy river. 

This earth is not our resting place, 

This earth is not oui home, 
Though hear a little while we face 
Life's arrows as they come; 
We soon shall be at home. 

Oh, for a multitude of resurections! 

Personal integrity, commercial honor, 
Christian love; that lying lips may 
close and gossipers may cease their 
babbling. 

That a yard shall once more mean 
thirty-six inches, a pound sixteen 
ounces, that chalk and water shall no 
longer be a synonym for milk or sand 
for sugar: that •'brotherly love may 
contimie," and all the world be our 
neighbors, every human being a 
brother and Gcd our father. 

Oh. for a resurecticn of purity and 
peace; clean kitchens, clean politics, 
clean clothes, clean habits, a chaste 
conversation and a consecrated press. 
No more scolding wives or cross hus- 
bands, no more bristle of steel or smell 
of gunpowder: no more factions in so- 
ciety and in the church. Oh. for a 
present incarnation of the character of 
Jesus and a resurection to power and 
action while it is called today. 

Christ is risen, he is risen, 
He hath left his rocky prison. 
And the white-robed angels glimmer 
Mid the cerements of his grave. 

He hath smitten with his thunder 
Everj' gate of brass asunder: 
He hath burst the iron fetters; 
Irresislibie to save! 

Oh, the gladness and the glory 
Of the blessed Easter story, 
Oh. the quick, electric thrilling. 
Of the Pentecostal flame. 

Death of death, of Life the Giver. 
Keign, O Victor King, forever. 
Lowly we thy sous adore thee. 
Glory, glory to thy name! 

—Frederick W. Farrar, D. IX 



ffcg ifeorGb laestiDD, 



WHAT CONSTITUTES A VALID CHURCH. 



The subject of the church is a, much 
vexed one. The word itself is of some- 
what uncertain origin, and of variable 
use. It may apply to a house of wor- 
ship — a Jewish or heathen temple. 

"The troops should soon pull down 
the church of Jove." — Marlowe. 

It may also be applied to any organ- 
ized body of worshippers, any denom- 
ination or sect. The aggregato of re- 
ligious influence in a community, or 
the whole professing world, also rep- 
resentative ecclesiastical bodies. 

Now by the Christian church, I do 
not mean a certain sect that arrogate 
to themselves that name; but I mean 
the actual body, the bride, the temple 
of 'the son of God. 

That Jesus organized, or caused to 
be organized, a church in the world, 
will not be disputed; but did He organ- 
ize His church or leave the work to 
other hands and times? God had, for 
ages, chosen to operate thro' a chosen 
people, Israel. They were God's pecu- 
liar people. Then was his vineyard 
let. (See parable of the Husbandman). 
God has had a people from time immem- 
orial. There have also been divine 
ceremonies ever since the days of the 
iirst martyr, Abel. From that day un- 
to the present, whether or not, my 
readers, God has honored you with the 
melodies of his speech, God has been 
talking to the sons of men. I doubt 



not that all men will a^ree that that 
people or person or persons through 
whom God manifests himself unto the 
world is the agent, the body — for the 
body is only the agent through which 
the knowing, feeling, willing, soul act 
— the church of the living God. 

The original ceremonial rights of 
God's people were conducted by the 
head of the family, the father, and 
handed down to the eldest son. 

A custom which in part or part of 
the custom, viz., the oversight of the 
family worship and religion, which 
has not, nor will ever pass from the 
parents. 

Church Jey/ish.— The first church 
was the household, the tent was the 
sanctuary, a rude pile of stones was the 
alter, the father was the priest, the 
family and its retainers were the wor- 
shiping congregation. For a time the 
oldest son succeeded to the priestly of- 
fice of the father; but when Moses, un- 
der the divine guidance, established a 
church in the wilderness, the sons of 
Aaron were made the priests of the na- 
tion, a tabernacle for public worship 
took the place of the individual tent, 
and an elaborate ceremonial was or- 
ganized, to be at a later period more 
perfectly developed in the Temple-ser- 
vice under David. Four features char- 
acterized the Jewish church. The 
priests, who conducted the sacrimental 



28 



WHAT CONSTITUTES 



services, but rarely or liever preached; 

the prophets, who served as J .he instruc- 
tors of the people, but held no official 
position in the church and were not 
even ordained; the Temple, which was 
the center and heart of the whole Jew- 
ish ecclesiastical system; and the scrip- 
tures, which constituted the authority 
to which the prophets appealed and by 
which their teachings were to be test- 
ed. The destruction of the Temple 
and the captivity of the Jews under 
Nebuchadnezzar put an end for a time 
to the ritualistic service cf the church, 
and gave birth to the synagogues (qv) 
which organization in a foreign land, 
where the annual visit to the Temple 
was impossible, were subsequently car- 
ried into Palestine and established 
there, becoming centers of worship and 
ilnsteUffitiQii^ subsidiary to, but never 
3jmp;p!ianeing, the Temple itself. The 
church was, until the time of Christ, a 
national establishment, supported by 
a tax levied upon the people. — Abbott. 

A.11, except, perhaps, the Jew, will 
&gt?i>§ that the Jewish church was well 
nigh & wreck when Jesus came. No 
prophet for 400 years, save false ones, 
who darkened council. 

Forsaking all foreign discussion, let 
us confine ourselves to arguments as to 
the establishment or not of a Christian 
church, or THE Christian church, and 
who organized the Christian church, 
when was it organize 1 and what the 
order of organization, worship and 
succession, if such there be, and what 
the source and limit of authority of. 
or within the church, 

John comes crying in the wildner- 
ness: "He is the sent of God to pre- 
pare the way of the Lc^rd." 

Some few persons have argued that 
when Jusus was Publicly baptized of 



John that it was the kingdom set u\L 
But this view must meet with embar- 
rassing difficulties. 

First, John was a forerunner, advance 
agent. His preaching was sorrow for 
their evil and public confession and re- 
nunciation. It was a baptism of Jewish 
penitants, and in its effect upon the 
person, corresponds to our child bap- 
tism of today. 

True, Jesus submits to this but all 
agree — only a submission. Now if 
Christ's baptism was Christian baptism 
then the church was established by 
John. and Jesus should, at that rate, be 
only an honored member of his own 
empire. 

Others have conceived the idea that 
the church was organized by Jesus 
when he called his disciples to follow 
him. While this doubtless is an initial 
step in the right direction, it is not the 
ultimate step. These men must be 
trained. Their temporal notions cf the 
Messiah's kingdom' must be changed. 
They must be schooled. But mark this. 
the Jewish worship and customs are 
still in vogue, and He who spake as 
never man spake, submits to all these, 
breathing the remarkable sentiment 
that we are too slow to receive. "It 
becometh us to fulfill all righteous- 
ness." All things are lawful (right) for 
me, but not all things are expedient. 

Some have suggested that when the 
seventy were sent out two and two. the 
home missionaries, throughout all Jew- 
ry that this was the beginning of the 
Kingdom. 

Rev. R. S. Mc Arthur D. D.. said the 
"corner stone of Christ's church was 
laid in his tomb." While the great 
mass of Christendom think it was en the 
day of Penticcst that the church was 
organized. All of these are. in a meas- 



A VALID CHURCH', 



29 



ure correct, yet none of them absolute- 
ly. All these things were inductive 
steps. But the consumation was not 
reached until "Pentecost was fully 
come." 

We have enough human machinery 
to convert the world in ten years, but 
machinery is only a means of apply- 
ing power, and not power itself. 

Paul speaks of "above 500 brethren' ' 
seeing the Lord at once which would 
ndicate some degree of fellowship if 
northing more — and to many would in- 
dicate organization. 

Still another scripture may be sug- 
gested. "I have not called you serv- 
ants but friends. I pray not for the 
world, but for those whicn thou hast 
given mo out of the world, etc." 

This when and whom and order is and 
shall remain an open question, until all 
meD come into the unity of the spirit 
and the bonds of peace. 

As to the ecclesiastical system, there 
has ever been much quibble. The 
"Apostolical succession" myth is too 
absurd for honest men, who are his- 
torians, to allege. 

The Catholic (Roman) can nearest 
trace their succession to the apostles. 
The Episcopal must go to the Catholic, 
from whom they rebelled, for their suc- 
cession, and the very church (Romish) 
from which they must get their au- 
thority, denies their validity. 

The difficulty here arising is the old 
feud of the disciples "which shall be 
greatest." This dispute is caused by 
depending too much upon ritual and to 
little on spirit. But some go to the 
other extreme. But the "Apostolic 
Secessionists" forbid all others be- 
cause they follow not with them. 
When the'disciples came in from their 
missionary tour they said: "We found 
some people doing as we did, and we 



forbade them." Jesus rebuked theik • 
"Forbid them not. They that are notfc 
against us are for us. " 

The world is not able to decide either 
with regard to the meaning' of eccles- 
iastical terms. Presbyter, bishop, 
elder, teacher, ruler, deacon, steward, 
minister, servant, embassador, evange- 
list, etc. It is not at all probable that 
the Son of God would fail to be explicit 
upon things that are absolutely neces- 
sary, nor is he so. 

The Letter (ritual, law, ceremony. 
hand writing of ordinances which was 
against us) killeth, but the Spirit 
giveth Life." 2nd Cor. 3;6. 

"It is the Spirit that quickeneth the 
flesh profltoth nothing: The words 
that I speak unto you they are spirit 
and they are life." Jno. 6-63. 

Peter said: "I perceive of a truth 
that God is no respecter os persons." 

But in every notion he that feareth 
him and worketh righteusness is ac- 
cepted with him. Acts 10 34 and 35. 

Paul wrote to Timothy to commit the 
gospel. to "men apt to teach men who 
could teach others also."' 

"Now, if any have not the spsrit .of 
Christ they are none of his." Rom. 8 9. 

"The Idea of the Church.— The 
Christian religion (subjectively consid- 
ered) is a divine life wrought in the 
soul of the. believer in Jesus Christ by 
the Holy Ghost, whereby the man is 
united through Christ unto God, walks 
before him in holiness and finally dies 
in his favor, and is received into his 
Eternal glory. The personal relation 
lies wholly between the individual and 
God. But the instinct of this new life 
is to proprogate itself by diffusion, and 
for this diffusion it must have organi- 
zation. This organization is found in 
the church, whose function it is to 
make universal the religion of the in- 



30 



WHAT CONSTITUTES 



dividual. Moreover, the individual 
believer for the nourishment of his 
own spiritual life seeks communion 
with other believers; and the commun- 
ion is furnished by the church. The 
Christian church is a religious, moral 
society, connected together by a com- 
mon faith in Christ and which seeks to 
represent in its united life the King- 
dom of God announced by Christ. 
Christianity contains on one hand a 
divine philosophy, which we may call 
its religion, and a Divine polity which 
is its church. The church is the par- 
ticular form or expression of the King- 
dom of God, the institution through 
whose agency this spiritual and eter- 
nal Kingdom is to be made effective 
among men. 

But, although there are elements of 
truth in the statements already made, 
it is further true that the church under 
the dispensation of the spirit, is the 
necessary form or body of Christianity 
in the world. Not that the church is 
Christianity any more than the body 
of a man is his life. The object of 
Christianity is the redemption of man- 
kind: and the church is the divinely 
constituted means of the ordinary 
means of redemption to individuals of 
mankind. It is therefore something 
more and altogether higher than a 
mere form of society, or an organiza- 
tion springing, like any merely human, 
society, from the common wants and 
sympathies of those who unite to form 
it. It is the Kingdom and the royal 
dwelling place of Christ 'upon the 
earth.' It has, therefore, a life of its 
own, of which Christ is the source, in- 
dependent of the ordinary life of the 
order of nature. Christ, indeed, is the 
central source of life for both King- 
doms (the Kingdom of nature and the 



Kingdom of Grace), but the mode of 
his vivifying operation is very different 
in the one form what it is in the other. 
But the Romanist view (also the Greek 
and High Auglican) assumes that the 
church is a form of organic life im- 
posed upon the Christian society in a 
sort of outward way. The protestant 
doctrine, on the other hand, is, that 
the church is the divinely inspired or- 
ganic growth of the Christain life: not 
therefore a merely human society, but 
the society of the faithful, constituted 
by the Dinine spirit. 

The Romanist view makes the out- 
ward form of the church essential, and 
regards the internal nature as deriva- 
tive; the protestant view- regards the 
internal life as the real essence and 
the outward and visible form as deriva- 
tive, but both as divinely inspired and 
constituted. (Jno. 10. 16. Matt. 16. 18 
and 18, 15—18). 

The Scripture Idea.— In the N. T. 
the church denotes •'that one mystical 
body of which Christ is the sole head, 
and in the unity of which all saint-. 
whether in heaven or on earth, or else- 
where, are necessarily included as ccn- 
stituent parts." For . this church 
Christ gave himself. (Eph. 5,23.) This 
church chosen in him before the found- 
ation, of the world (Eph. 14. 1st Ptr. 1. 
2.) nourished and cherished- as his own 
flesh (Eph. 5, 29 and 30.). The church 
is called The House. The City, the 
Temple of God. • To whom coming-^ 
ye are built up a spiritual house, a 
holy temple, (1 Ptr. 2. 4 and 5). 

This spiritual temple is composed of 
all God"s people and is his dwelling 
place (1 1st Cor. 3. IT: 2 Cor. 6.16 Rev. 
21, 3: 22, 11 and 15.) The church is uni- 
formly represented in the N. T. as the 
company of the saved: and they are 



A VALID CHURCH. 



31 



spoken of as the body of Christ. (1st 
Cor. 12,27 as one body, Eph. 3, 6; 4,4; 1 
Cor. 12, 13, 20,) Of this body Christ is 
the savior. Eph. 5, 23.) They are also 
his bride (Eph. 5. 31 and 32, Rev. 21, 9 
and 10) and his fullness. (Eph. 1,23). 
They are termed also the light of the 
world. (Matt. 5, 14) and the salt of the 
earth, (Matt. 5,13) and indicating- the 
church to be the true source of spiritu- 
al illumination and the instrument of 
salvation to the world. 

For the work which the church is to 
.accomplish for Christ by teaching, dis- 
cipling, comforting and &c. , it must 
neeessairly be visible though all of its 
members may not be known." — McClin- 
tick & Strong. 

The Christian Church.— Al- 
though the old testament is full of the 
church of God, the term occurs only in 
the new testament. The. Greek term 
of which it is a translation implies gen- 
erally "an assembly," civil or religious, 
and is in some cases properly so render- 
ed. In a religious sense, it signifies 
that bocly of persons whom God has 
gathered to be his servants. It is thus 
applied to Israel, the Lord's peculiar 
people, in Acts VII., 38, and Heb. II., 
12, where it corresponds to the congre- 
gation so frequently mentioned in the 
old testament. Thus the word, in 
apostotic times, has a general meaning 
of the assemblage or congregations of 
Christians. This meaning has of course 
many modifications. It is sometime a 
body belonging to or meeting in one 
house; (Rom., XVI. 5, 1 Cor. XVI., 19, 
Philem. 2.) sometimes the Christians 
of a city, as Jerusalem, where were at 
one time many thousands that believed; 
(Acts XV., 1; XVIIL, 22; XXL, 20; 2 
Thess. 1, 1) sometimes it is employed in 
a larger sense, within local or territori- 
al designation, (Rom. XVI., 4. 16) and 



it frequently comprised that great 
body of redeemed, the holy Catholic 
Church, the universal company, united 
in one living Head, "the fullness of 
him that filleth all in all. "—Matt. XVI., 
18, 1 Cor. XII, 28; Gal. 1, 13; Eph. 1, 
22, 23; III, 10; N, 25, 30. Heb. XII., 23. 

So much is clear: but the moment we 
attempt to go beyond this meaning of 
the word and inquire what was the 
form of the organization, we are met 
with an almost insuperable difficulty. 
The most casual, reader of the New 
Testament can hardly fail to notice that 
there is no formal statement of that or- 
ganization; no ecclesiastical constitu- 
tion; no canons: no rules of discipline: 
not even a creed. We are left to con- 
jecture what the organization really 
was, from incidental hints and sugges- 
tions such as would give but little light 
even to unprejudicial minds. Two 
minds, however, are unprejudiced in 
approaching this subject. 

Each individual looks at the new 
testament through a modern atmos- 
phere, 'and hopes and expects to find in 
it a support for that particular form of 
church order and Christian faith 
which has become endeared to him. 
Instead of entering into the discussions 
which have abounded on this subject, 
and endeavoring to afford an analysis 
of the church of the New Testament, 
we shall briefly indicate to our readers 
the principal opinions upon the sub- 
ject. 

There is, in the first place, a funda- 
mental difference of opinion respecting 
the nature of the New Testament 
teaching concerning the church. 

A large majority of Christian theolo- 
gians—if the Roman Catholic clergy 
are included— are of the opinion that 
Jesus Christ came into the world ex- 
presslv to found a church; that he es- 



32 



WHAT CONSTITUTES 



tablished one with a definite organiza- 
tion, determined its form and functions, 
appointed its officers, gave them their 
authority and directed them to main- 
tain in perpetuity the institution he 
had thus created. This is the theory 
entertained by all Roman Catholics, 
by most Episcopalians, and by many in 
the other Protestant denominations. 
Those who hold this view consider that 
the New Testament affords an infalli- 
ble model of the true church, and that 
what we have to do is to ascertain by 
careful study the nature of the apos- 
tolical church and conform our own ec- 
clesiastical organizations thereto. 

The other views is that Christ did 
not establish any church organization. 
That he came simply to proclaim cer- 
tain truths, and by his life and 
death to set certain moral forces 
in operation, and that while he in- 
structed his followers to unite in church 
organizations, and better to promul- 
gate his teaching, he left it entirely to 
their discretion to frame these organ- 
izations according to the exigencies of 
the times in which they should live. 
In other words they hold that no one 
is absolute and infallible church model, 
but that church institutions, like civil 
institutions, must be adapted to the 
people, and should be and have been 
left flexible in order that they may be 
changed with the changing demands 
of different ages and countries. This 
view is held by a large number of de- 
vines in the Methodist. Presbyterian 
and Congregational churchs. The 
first of these views would have, per- 
haps, more to commend it if it secured 
any unity among those who embraced 
it. It does not; and those who seek to 
find in the apostolic times a model for 
a church of the nineteenth centuiy. 
differ quite as widely as to wha: that 



model is as do those whu endeavor 
without a model to conform their ec- 
clesiastical institutions to the wants of 
the time and the community. The 
views of both schools of interpreters 
may be classified under four general 
heads, though. these would not certain- 
ly include all known forms of church 
government, they would include the 
most important. These are the Papal, 
the Episcopal, the Presbyterian and 
Congregational. — Dictionary of Relig- 
ious Knowledge. 

If any force whatever is to be given 
to the form cf organization, it should 
be Gummed up in the word simplicity. 
Again, come denominations claim to 
stand for sound doctrine, and hence 
claim superiority over ether churches, 
and therefore ask to have the pre-emi- 
nence. They remind me of what a 
drinking man once said: "I am a Pre:- 
byterian in faith, but a little irregular 
in the practice." 

Of what value is a sound theology if 
the character is putriCed. cr a sound 
ritual if the heart is rotten'/ 

If the church rneazs anything, it 
means fellowship and effectiveness, 
hence, "by their fruits ye shall, know ' 
them." Matt. 11-5. 

Close baptism i also held at a nec- 
essity, which gives rise to close com- 
munion. Here too we" hare extremes. 
The Baptist immersing and the United 
Presbyterian effusing. But to show the 
rediculoasness to these things we need 
only to- follow their history a little way 
back to find an unbaptized man baptiz- 
ing himself and the others, cr cue un- 
baptized man baptising another, and 
he in turn baptizing the administrator 
of the holy ordinance. It is another 
form of that questionable sueeessie::. 

Editor Ram's Hern: As I presume 



A VALID <3!aURCltv 



33 



your columns .are always <<apen to any 
■controversy that might arise from the 
publication of the .articles irom one of 
the great leaders of the "^denomina- 
tions," I am constrained to address to 
you this personal letter covering a f 6w,- 
to me, important points. 

1. I desire you to note .a distinction 
which you have evidently not met or 
have overlooked. There .are tint thrQe 1 
historic churches. (1) The Oeek 
church, (2) the Roman church-, and (3) 
the Anglican and American church 
{Episcopal).) All other religious bodies 
are denominations or sects, (I use the 
word etymologically.) 

2. You state "that denominational 
differences are no longer basic 'arid 
radical, but are mostly of temperment 
and tradition" I must ask leave to 
make one exception to this. The dif- 
ference between the Episcopal (Angli- 
can and American) church and all the 
denominations are besic and radical, 
inasmuch as we alone have the New 
Testament three-fold ministry of bish^ 
op, priest and deacon. The Episcopal 
church stands today in line with Acts 
2:42, "They continued steadfastly in 
the apostles' doctrine, and in breaking 
of (1) bread and in the (2) prayers." 

Here we have four essential "notes" 
of the New Testament church, and 
none of the modern denominations 
have these, hence they are not 
church in the New Testament sense of 
the word church, but denominations or 
societies. I write candidly and with a 
full knowledge of human origin and the 
facts of the case. I hope whoever will 
write or has written, of the Episcopal 
church wilt be clear on these funda- 
mental points. 

Yours, a lover of the Rain's Horn, 
J. C. Quinn, Rector St. John's Church. 



This- ccr-r-es$ondeht is worthy of con- 
gratulation for his candor, and es- 
pecially for his peculiar privilege of 
writing "with a full knowledge of 
human origin and facts in- the case." 
In this respect he is distinguished be- 
yond many of the most erudite students 
Of church history. We remember a* 
remark fo Phillips Brooks (himself the 
greatest American Episcopalian of his 
day) to the effect that the peculiar 
claims of his church to apostolic suc- 
cession and other exclusive inherit- 
a)n6e& could not be easily proved. If 
such claims of being the church as are 
made by cur correspondent fail to com- 
mand the support of men like the late 
bishop of Massachusetts and other lead- 
ing Episcopalians, he can imagine how 
preposterous, not to say humorous,, 
they sound to people outside of the 
Episcopalian denomination. 

According; to' -the abbve letter it ap 
pears that these rash claims to exclu- 
sive proprietorship in the name church 
are based on New Testament usage as 
indicated in Acts 1:42 and elsewhere.. 
Fancy for a moment the Lord Jesus 
coming to this world and undergoing 
trial, persecution and death to redeem 
a race and found an institution for 
their culture and protection and stak- - 
ing its very existence on form, usage ' 
or tradition; on bishops, priests and 
elders; on attitudes, genuflections, reel' 
lights and wafers. Absurd! No! . He 
went deeper' for his impregnable foun- - 
datioii; He took his own divine, match- 
less, faultless person and commanded 
worship, faith and confession of that 
faith* tfpoh' that rock he built his' 
church; Faith in Christ is the founda- 
tion of the Christian's hope. Confes- - 
sion of that faith is the foundation of " 
Ihe cllureh: These are its divine ere-- 



34 



WHAT CONSTITUTES 



dentials, and if they will not pass mus- 
ter before ecclesiastical councils on 
earth they will be accepted at the 
Headquarters of the King. 

To use an illustration from R. B. 
Foster D.D.: "Suppose a company were 
shipwrecked on the shore of a far-off is- 
land — a sort of Robinson Crusoe wreck. 
There is not a religious person among 
them, but there are some Bibles. They 
study the scriptures, pray, receive the 
spirit. Their lives are transformed, 
many of them at any rate. They never 
see ships, they don't pass that way. 
They want to sustain worship, evangel- 
ize the heathen alreaey upon the island, 
and the remainder of their own com- 
pany. Those who have received the 
spirit want to be baptised, want to 
honor the Lord and take advantage of 
the grace of the communion. 

Can they do so? And they want a 
church. Can they have it? They want 
a preacher, and one of their number 
feels moved to preach. Can they have 
a fully equipped church, a valid church? 
We assert that they can, for 'One is 
your master even Christ, and all ye are 
brethren." Matt. 8-28. 



"I am the way, the truth and the 
life." Jno. 14-6. "In him we move and 
have our being." 

If we are in Christ we are new crea- 
tures and have new life, new duties, 
new thoughts and feelings. We are in 
a new world. Old things are passed 
away; all things have become new. 

The Kingdom of God cometh not with 
observation but with power, not with 
outward goodness, but with inward 
purity; not of fuss, but of faith: not -of 
robes, but of righteousness. 

It cometh unnoticed and silent, 

Like the swell of the ocean wide. 

Men wake and sleep— deep calleth to deep, 
And the land is whelmed in the tide. 

It comes not "with observation," 

As the nations wheel to line; 
The crimson light on the hills of night 

Of its dawning gives the sign. 

But it cometh first and swiftly, 

To each soul whose entrance gate 

Stands wide, O King, that thou may'st come in 
With thy train in royal state ! 

A.nd we, while we send good tidings 
To the souls that wait thy "Word, 
-Would labor and pray that thy Kingdom may 
Come daily in us, O I,ord! 

—REBECCA P. REED. 



7M Sfcarcfe Hagstioil, 



•CHAPTER II.— THE MISSION OP THE CHURCH. 



The church, as now defined, is the 
family of God on earth. It is the agen- 
cy of the Spirit. 

"As many as are led by the Spirit 
of God they are the sons of God." God 
hath declared his sons to be also suns 
or lights. (Matt. 5:16.) We are to so 
shine as to make the gain of Godliness 
clear. So shine as to reprove the un- 
fruitful works of darkness. As individ- 
uals we are to do as the leviathan, "He 
maketh a path to shine after him" — 
Job 41:32. The church then is God's 
commissioned light house, whose rays 
should reveal not only the placid har- 
bor to ships now in life's rugged sea, 
but which reveals the rocks of ruin, 
and "the perdition of ungodly men." 

A little leaven leaveneth the whole 
lump. The church is to be the social, 
mental and moral leaven of this pres- 
ent world. 

Every man knows there is something 
wrong with the world. It will not 
raise. It is the man lifting himself by 
his boot straps. Pormation, not refor- 
mation of character is the world's need. 
The world is not in need of quantity but 
quality. The mission of the church is 
not to, so much, enlarge as to enliven 
the world. The church is not Chris- 
tianity any more than glass jars are 
electricity. The church contains Chris- 
tianity — contains it only as the house 
contains the tenant, or better, the 



landlord. The church must contain 
and emit a life-giving force to society. 
The church is the fountain of' all good 
society. If a stranger wishes to get ac- 
quainted — acquainted with the best 
people of a place— he usually goes to 
church. No true church lacks socia- 
bility. The power of this leaven lies in 
the individual units that constitute the 
church, and their example of sociability - 
and fellowship with each other. 

The church is the leaven of educa- 
tion. The church maintains more col- 
leges and academies than the state, in- 
dividuals and secular corporations com- 
bined. The church also furnishes a 
long list of newspapers and magazines 
to the current literature of the day, 
and furnishes as many books and teach- 
ers of distinction as the remainder of 
the world. Infidelity never built a col- 
lege, never established a mission for 
the mental and physical training of 
children or the rescue of women, nor 
has it ever made a crusade against the 
saloons, neither against the ignorance 
of heathenism. The church must fur- 
nish instruction in physics and ethics. 
Then this word leaven contains the 
idea of raising. We must elevate men 
by example, but not by example only. 
We must elevate them by putting a life 
into them. 

The church is, still further, the salt 
of the earth. I scarcelv need discuss 



36 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



the action of common salt. You have 
come to use salt as a synonym for savor. 

Now, there is the law of purification, 
which acts about the same in society as 
in meat. Men — society men — are apt 
to be tainted. We must lift up society 
and put something- on it to preserve it 
in this better state — keep it from being- 
spoiled again. It will take a great deal 
of savory influence to keep the world — 
the whole world — from decomposing. 

There is much in heredity. It is no 
mere phantom. The whole human 
race has a down hill bias. In the flesh 
there is no soundness, so also the mind 
becomes tainted with the foul blood of 
the flesh. So there is no soundness in 
our thinking until the poison has been 
taken out of men's lives. The world's 
blood poison mentioned in 2 Thess. 2:7, 
must be eradicated and the sting of the 
serpent removed and the patient saved 
(salted) by a sight of what the brazen 
serpent typified. Not a literal scene of 
the cross and its sacrifice, but a literal 
scene of his character in the church — 
self-surrender, charity peace, joy. 

The church is to be brilliant (attrac- 
tive), powerful (uplifting), healing (sa- 
vory). 

The mission of the church is as wide 
as the nations, as high as the heavens, 
and as long as the generations. The 
lonely frontier is as much its territory 
as the great cities; the penitentiary * as 
the palace; and the bawdy house as 
much as the burial of the dead. 

The church is especially a medical 
institute. Its head is the Grsat Physi- 
cian. Its duty is to soothe minds, heal 
hearts, bind up wounds, reduce fevers, 
cure tempers, allay deadly thirsts, raise 
the socially, morally and mentally dead 
to newness of life. 



The church is also commisssoned to 
duly maintain the ordinances and dis- 
pense the word of life. If it were not 
for the organized body of the church 
what could come of missionary enter- 
prizes, etc.? 

The church is commissioned to pro- 
tect the rest day of humanity. All ex- 
perience teacher that earnest labor 
with regular cessation, and that one- 
seventh of the time is the most advan- 
tageous for health and longevity, is the 
best mode of life. 

It is further the mission of the church 
to promote good citizenship. No man 
can be a Christian and be a bad citi- 
zen. 

It is also the mission of the church 
to so impress men with a knowledge of 
the universal dependence and relation 
of humanity that "nation shall not war 
with nation:"' '"that one man shall not 
do violence to another, and to so pro- 
mote personal piety that the children, 
the horses, the cattle and even the 
dogs will know that men are Christians 
because of their unusual gentleness. 

Then the church is set to zealously 
guard the truth. It is not dogmatics, 
not tradition, but truth, that she must 
defend. This realm is limited only by 
the confines of truth. All truth is a 
species of revelation. 

The mission of the church is pro- 
gress. The church and the pulpit, es- 
pecially, are to lead in every laudable 
undertaking. The church is to save 
the convict, the cynic, the pessimist, 
the swearer, the drinker, the - talker, 
the tatler, the tardy, the unfortunate. 
and even the lazy, by its purifying, en- 
livening, enlightening and sustaining 
influence. In short the church is to 



THE MISSION OF THE CHURCH. 



37 



promote all that is good and demote all 
that is bad. 

Rev. T. DeWitt Talmage D. D. said : 
"A church's mission is not to make 
men philosophers, although it teaches 
the best philosophy; nor to make scien- 
tific explorations, although it is the 
best friend of science; nor to organize 
and write constitutions, although its 
inculcations lead to the wisest political 
economy; but to balk profligacy, to de- 
throne superstition', to emancipate spir- 
itual bondage; to break in twain the 
prison bolts, to soothe human pain, to 
turn the human race on to the high 
pathway of heaven. This is the 
church's mission, and whatever cross 
it may have on the church-top, and 
however beautiful an altar or pulpit- 
front, and however high-sounding and 
magnificent the service, failing in this 
it fails in all. It may be a brazen can- 
dlestick, or a bronze -candlestick, but 
not a golden candlestick." 

Rev. Thomas Arnold ■ said; "The 
true and grand idea of a church is a so- 
ciety for the purpose of making men 
like Christ, earth like heaven, the 
kingdoms of the world the kingdom of 
Christ." 

A great many people look on the 
church as a passenger boat bound for 
heaven, where Jesus is the captain, the 
angels do the heavy work and the 
preachers wait on the people. A kind 
of palace car where music and re- 
freshments are furnished, and where it 
costs little to ride — cost according to 
the accommodations. 

The Master has said, "I must work 
the works of him that sent me while it 
is day"— John 9:4. 

Unto us he has said, "Go WORK to- 
day in my vineyard. 



Well has the poet said: 

"Sure I must fight if I would reign." 

Not leisure, but labor; not sacrifice, 
but service; not dozing, but doing, is 
the gospel plan. 

On this point the British and Foreign 
Evangelical Review says : ' 'The object 
of a church, whether it be established 
by law, or a purely voluntary associa- 
tion, is not liberty but service; and by 
its peculiar aptitude to render that ser- 
vice, and not by the amount of liberty 
its members enjoy in theological specu- 
lations, must its value be judged. A 
church is good, according as it pro- 
motes religion; just as a college is good 
as it trains well-finished scholars, and 
an army as it constitutes the invincible 
defense of a nation. 

It may be, and no doubt is important 
that consistently with the attainment 
of those ends, that the clergyman, the 
professor, the soldier; should enjoy a 
large measure of liberty; but the liber- 
ty, nevertheless, is but the incident, 
not the aim of the institution. ' ' 

And again this authority says: "Man 
is in rebellion; the church is to subdue 
him. Man is lost; the church is to 
point him to safety. Men are groan- 
ing and travailing together in pain: 
the church is to tell them of a great 
Physician, and thus to do for the world 
what the angel did for the pool when 
he rendered its waters healing. Men 
are debased; the church is to elevate 
them. They are polluted; she is to 
lead them to the ever open fountain. 
Man, moreover, is a slave; the church 
is appointed to proclaim liberty to the 
captive, through the great Deliverer, 
'the desire of all nations. ' " 

While I deprecate a union of church 
and state, the power of the state de- 



38 THE CHURCH QUESTION. 

pends upon the purity of ■ the church. what the so-called church (the prof es- 

We have seen what the church sors of Christianity) are doing at the- 

should do. Time would fail to tell present, and analyze a little further on f . 

what it has done. the probabilities for the future. 
We shall now attempt to briefly state 



Thz Bfmrgfi gagsiioD, 



CHAPTER III.-HOW TO TELL THE CHURCH OF CHRIST. 



You can't always tell a church by 
-the height of the spire or the size of 
the service bulletin. You can't tell 
•Christ's church by the size of the 
crowd. The Book says: "Few there 
be that find it;" "Now if any man have 
not the spirit of Christ, he is none of 
his. "—Romans 8:9. "Wherefore, by 
their fruits ye shall know them." — Mat- 
thew 7:20. It is impossible for us to 
discern the invisible except by impli- 
cation. We know such phenomena as 
magnetism and mind only, by reason of 
their influence en visible tangible ob- 
jects. 

So, also, of gravity and air. 

While religion has an invisible or 
spiritual side, which is often incompre- 
hensible, it also has a visible, ethical, 
tangible, business side. In our chase 
for the spiritual, and oftener, the eccle- 
siastical side of the church, we fail to 
attend to the business or practical side 
of religion. 

I think there is a peculiar signifi- 
cance in the business of every society 
that the church of Jesus Christ must 
learn before it will, cease to be said that 
the children cf Darkness are wiser than 
the children of Light in their clay and 
generation. It is poor government that 
keeps two parts of the same country at 
variance. It is poor discipline that 
causes two parts of the same army to 
■collide on the field of battle. The 



death of General Stonewall Jackson in 
our late war was a striking example of 
the result of such action. The world, 
and the flesh, and the devil are pitted 
against the chnrch. Shall the church 
be divided against itself? "A house di- 
vided against itself — . " Shall Christ be 
divided against himself? Shall the 
hand and foot, the eye and ear, be at 
war one with the other? 

An internal foe is worse than an ex- 
ternal army. A secret enemy is more 
dangerous than an open one. For 
proof you need only to think of the 
"false friends" of your own experience; 
of Judas Iscariot, and the history of 
any war.- 

The Bible teaches above everything 
else the blessings of unity. "Let there 
be no divisions — strife — among you." 
"That they all may be one, as thou, 
Father, art in me and I in thee; that 
they also may be one in us, that the 
world may believe that thou hast sent 
me." 

Our divisions and contentions are the 
most fruitful of all sources of unbelief. 

We are commanded to "be workers 
together. ' ' But this does not have so 
much reference to place as to purpose. 

It often happens that in Oklahoma 
towns there is a church to every hun- 
dred inhabitants. 

We might argue that churches are a 
good thing, and therefore the more the 

39 



40 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



better. But not so. We can have 
more of a good thing than is good. 
For example, food is of itself a primary 
good, but that does not signify that one 
cannot eat too much. But you argue 
that there are many out of the kingdom 
and going down to death, and hence 
the need of Christian work. We are 
agreed here. Christian work is one 
thing and church work may be quite 
another thing. The cause of this state 
of affairs has been hinted at in a pre- 
vious chapter. What is the result? 
In a town of one thousand people, as 
this one, there are ten or eleven 
churches. 

Now -what is the business side of this 
matter? The truth is there is no busi- 
ness about it. It means poor poople. 
poor congregations and the gospel 
poorly preached to them. I will give 
you four samples of how we carry on 
the Lord's business. 

In the first place I shall mention, 
there are eleven churches — organiza- 
tions — and six buildings. There are 
eight pastors and as many local preach- 
ers. The place has 1100 people. About 
300 will count the average church atten- 
ance. Within a radius of fifteen miles 
a half dozen communities may be 
found that have neither preaching nor 
Sunday school. 

Of course none of these churches are 
self-supporting. The first church in 
this place was a Congregational church. 
This church has a house of worship 
costing $1200. $400 of the pastor's sal- 
ary is paid by the missionary society 
and the church promises as much more. 
It costs $25 per year for the janitor and 
as much more for incidentals. Next 
came the Methodist Episcopal. Their 
building cost about $2500. The mis- 



sionary society gives $80 per annum 
and the church pledges $500 more. 
Their expenses are not less than $50 a 
year. Next came the Presbyterian, 
with their pastor's salary at $800, $550 
of which is paid by the mission board. 
Their building cost about $1500. Next 
in point of time, I believe, was the 
Methodist Episcopal South. They 
have a $1700 house and $200 of the pas- 
tor's salary is paid by the missionary 
society of the- church. The Unite'd 
Brethren have been spending $100 per 
year and a preacher just to keep a. foot 
hold. There are a few Baptists who 
maintain an organization at an expense 
of $150 to the missionary society, after 
having raised $200 among themselves. 
The Disciple church maintains an or- 
ganization, but have no services. And, 
worse still, they attend no other ser- 
vices. They probably have the largest 
membership in the place, but have no 
property. The Catholics are arrang- 
ing to build in this same town. Not 
satisfied with the religious aspect of the 
city, the Protestant Episcopal enters 
the arena. Their house of worship cost 
$1500. The rector's salary is $500. S180 
of which is paid by their missionary so- 
ciety. The True Followers, a class of 
Mormons, is a blessing(?) that not all 
places enjoy. They have no property. 
And I have no idea that they pay their 
preacher anything: in fact they are all 
preachers. Then the Christian Science 
people are also represented here. They' 
have a house of worship costimg about 
$800. All of these houses have cost no 
small amount to the several . church 
building societies. Aggregate $3500. 

There can be but one result emanat- 
ing from such a cause; viz. strife — di- 
vision of feelings and forces. 



HOW TO TELL THE CHURCH OF CHRIST. 



41 



The next place to which I shall call 
your attention is a town of about the 
same population. They are less fa- 
vored( '?) than the first place. Only nine 
churches exist here: Congregational, 
Presbyterian, Baptist, two Christian or 
Disciples, Methodist Episcopal and 
Methodist Episcoprl South, Catholic, 
and Quaker or Friends. The Friends, 
Congregational, Catholic, Baptist and 
South Methodists have houses of wor- 
ship. The respective cost of these 
houses is $900, $800, 81000, $800, $800. 
The building societies have invested 
respectively $500, $500, unable to as- 
certain, 8100, $400. All of the organi- 
zations have pastors, and the various 
boards are assisting in the sum of $1865, 
independent of the Catholic, annually. 

The next place has 2000^ people. 
They enjoy the extreme joy of but fif- 
teen churches, with local expenses and 
pastors' salaries ranging from $400 to 
$1600 each. I am inclined to the opin- 
ion that luxuries are expensive; espec- 
ially when all this waste of finance is 
the smallest part of the expenses. Oh ! 
think of the Sunday school li- 
braries and literature, the song books 
and organs, the furniture and fixtures, 
and then, above all else, the wasted ef- 
forts of God's men. Think of the bur- 
den on the minds and hearts of the half 
fed and half learned preachers. The 
half — or less than half — filled houses. 
Why all this outlay of men and means? 
'Is it for the glory of God? I fear that 
it is for the greed of men. The result 
of selfishness, stubbornness, willfulness, 
and sinfulness of men. 

This excessive denominationalism 
and inordinate un-Christian zeal is a 
sore eye to the body Christ. 

This thing is a sore eye financially, 
socially and spiritually. 



We have more creed than Christ. 
More dogmatics than deliberation. 
More selfishness, than salvation. 

Include me in the list with yourself 
also. "By their fruits ." 

Now, spiritually, there is great gain 
in fellowship and co-operation ; prayer, 
one accord. This is further a menace 
intellectually. 

The realm of the pulpit is truth, all 
truth. While all that is in the Bible is 
true, not all truth is in the Bible. 

The Pulpit is a teacher. Preach — or 
teach — the word. Be ready to give a 
reason to him that asketh. "Men apt 
to teach. " ' 'Rightly dividing the word 
of truth." We cannot command strong 
men at our salaries. The people are 
burdened and the men cramped. If we 
had a good man we would keep him 
worrying to know where the next meal 
was coming from. 

Then there are people who justly 
say: "I don't want to be a Christian if 
this is a sample." Some prefer to stay 
out of the church because of the finan- 
cial pressure. Others are discouraged 
with the deceit, craft, backbiting, etc., 
done in order to succeed (as they call 
it). Some people say — within them- 
selves — ''We must smurch that man be- 
cause some of our members have been 
out to hear him preach. We must say 
he did something or said something — 
or he might. " 

There are others who have not 
clothes sufficient to attend services. 

Now if we had three good church 
houses in each of the foregoing places, 
with Godly pastors and prayerful, lov- 
ing people, they would do ten times 
what is done. First, they would have 
the means to do with; and second, they 
would have more time to work for the 



42 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



Lord, as it would not take so much 
time to watch each other. 

The misfortune of our plight is obvi- 
ous, but what is the remedy? 

The remedy is the same for most all 
the towns I know in Oklahoma; viz: 
consolidation. I believe some in the 
survival of the fittest. I feel sure not 
all can survive. 

If the Bible teaches anything-, it is 
the blessing- of unity and the sorrow of 
division. "Let there be no divisions 
among you." "Behold how good! and 
how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell 
together in unity. " — Ps. 133:1. See al- 
so Eph. 4:3 and 4;13: 1st Peter 3:8, and 
Eph. 4:32. 

Now everybody wants church union 
if it goes their way. But what must 
be the grounds of right and of union? 

First, I would say, "priority;" second, 
doctrine. Few people with a thimble 
full of brains object to a community of 
persons who love our Lord and -who as- 
sociate themselves together under some 
form of pledge or covenant, written or 
implied, being called a church. 

As churches Ave claim to be parts of 
God's great host to conquer the world. 
Thousands upon thousands have not the 
gospel, while we well nigh run over 
each other to get to "our own" church 
in some places; and "our own" means 
more than we intend it to, for it may 
thus imply that it is human, not Di- 
vine. 

We mass our forces on one point and 
neglect the remainder of the field — no 
we swarm so thick we can't thrive and 
leave the greater part of humanity 
faint and dying for the "bread and wa- 
ter of life," while we elide the few with 
over-feed so that even they do not do 
well. 



I do not plead over-production, but 
an improper distribution of the church- 
es. There is plenty of room in the 
Master's vineyard for all laborers who 
desire the honor of the Father in spirit 
and in truth. No character of church 
union can be more efficient than union 
of effort. Organic union may never 
come, but comity should be here al- 
ready. The world is wide and quite 
widely neglected. 

I can see no good reason for eight or 
ten churches in one place, and six or 
eight places near at hand without any 
church privileges. Further: In any 
of the three places above sighted two 
or three good churches could have been 
built with but little outside aid. and 
they would now be self-supporting. Oh; 
The good" that might be accomplished 
with the near $6000 expended annually 
on pastors' salaries. What good these 
servants of God might do in neglected 
fields. What good God's people could 
accomplish in the fields occupied. The 
efforts of many of God's servants, are 
worse than lost. Nor is it a waste. of 
both men and money only: for frQm 
these things come debates and divisions 
of every sort. We should remember, 
too, that God will bring every work in- 
to judgment. 

We shall now take the fourth exam- 
ple. This is a town of 800. They have 
only two charches. The results ob- 
tained show a veay superior state of af- 
fairs. There are less saloons and far 
more church members, proportionately, 
than in either of the other places. 
There is the closest bond of fellowship 
and co-operation among the believers. 
They labor together as though they all 
belonged to the same church. They 
are nearly self-supporting — may. really 



HOW TO TELL THE CHURCH OF CHRIST. 43 



become so by the time this has reached it is love that thou lackest, to make thee bold, 

Who shall make thy love hot that is frozen so 
cold? 



you. 

"They that have not the spirit of 



Thou art not happy as thou mightest be; 

Christ are none of his. " For the love of Tesus is little in thee 

"By their fruits ye shall know them." __ , ■ . n ,„ , 

More salvation and less selfishness 

The church goes on in its own poor way, ... .. . _,._■ . ni . ., 

There is rest by night aud high spirits by day Wl11 hrin % thlS Problem CO its proper 

Yet the church is not happy as the church solution, 
should be. 
Why is it? Why is it? Oh, answer me. 



Th% SfiargB (tagsfion. 

CHAPTER IV.— THE POOR AXD THE GOSPEL. 



"The poor have the gospel preached 
to them. '" Thus said Jesus to John's 
disciples. He who spake as never man 
spake preaching to the poor! The 
poor always had the preference with 
Jesus.. "He hath chosen the poor, rich 
in faith." Again he said. "Blessed 
are the poor in spirit."' But we have 
greatly advanced(?) since the Master's 
time. We are way past the poor long 
ago. and now the poor have the gospel 
poorly preached to them, if preached 
at all. It can be sustained as a propo- 
sition that today the poor don't have 
the gospel preached to them. It is not 
because the gospel is not for the poor. 
or has outlived the poor, for we "have 
the poor with us always. " 

What then is the reason for this 
statement? If we are specially com- 
missioned to go out into the highways 
and hedges and bring in hither the 
halt, the maimed, the lame and the 
blind: if it is the same gospel, the same 
Master, the same love that sought Laz- 
arus at the gate, why does it fail to find 
the beggar of today? 

The reason is found in creed having 
supplanted Christianity, and denomina- 
tionalism. devotion. Church people of 
today are quitting "Unto the poor the 
gospel is preached,"' and refusing to so 
much as speak to poor and unfortunate 
persons. And again our churchmen 
sing. "The Lord shall supply all of 



your needs."' and cease the song only to 
go home and turn a beggar hungry 
from their door. Oh. ye who are liv- 
ing epistles: ye who are known and 
read of all men: ye who are to be the 
salt of the earth: the leaven of society: 
the light of the world: the mile posts 
to heaven: the signboards of salvation: 
exponents of Christianity, what is the 
writing that men read in your conduct? 
Why do ye so shut yourselves up from 
the putrifying scenes of society? Why 
do ye stay so far away from the meal of 
humanity with your leaven of love?. 
How far would men think it was to 
heaven by reading your daily walk? 
Why do you never uncover your relig- 
ious light, save on Sundays? Won't 
your candle burn in the wind? What 
ratio of increased power does the world 
see that Christianity gives you to con- 
trol your temper, your tongue and your 
horse trades? Selfishness and wcrldli- 
ness is the cause of all this neglect of 
the poor and of real devotion — piety. 

The church, instead of being- "in the 
world."' but not "of the world." has 
been getting the world into the church, 
not the church — Godly worship — into 
the world. 

But there is still a deeper cause for 
this selfishness and worldliness. it is 
denominationalism. 

I want to be intensely practical, 
hence will use facts within mv own 



THE POOR AND THE GOSPEL. 



45 



knowledge. In a town of two thousand 
people there are fourteen churches. 
Salaries range from $1800 down to $350. 
There is a continual struggle: First, 
for an audience, and as a result, many 
unwise measures resorted to. Second, 
for the pastor's salary. The salary 
must be had. Grab-bag, social, musi- 
cale, cantata, elocution, theater and 
dance are resorted to. Every church 
in town bids for wealth. A wealthy 
man can get any kind of offer if he will 
join "our church." The poor are ig- 
nored, because they can't do anything 
for the church. They have no social 
and financial influence. The regula- 
tions of the church at large, or the re- 
ligion of the candidate, has little to do 
with accepting members. For exam- 
ple, a man and wife able to pay $100 
per year, who had no church relation, 
no church letters: The Congregational 
and Methodist Episcopal churches were 
making special bids for this man. He 
said he would join the Methodists if it 
were not for the probation. He would 
never join on probation. The result 
was the rules were "suspended" — I 
guess you would call it that — and this 
man and his wife accepted as full mem- 
bers. About six months later he and 
the preacher had a spat, and the Con- 
gregational people made him an offer — 
at least such is the talk — and the man 
came to the Congregational church, 
where he was still a member in official 
position a year or two ago. 

This is one example out of a thousand 
that might be given with reference to 
the premiums offered for wealth by all 
denominations. 

My own mother, near all her life a 
Congregationalism in the absence of the 
Congregational church, once joined 



the Baptist church. She led the music 
and was at that time much needed in 
that particular congregation. She re- 
fused to be immersed, but the church 
did not refuse her membership. 

A certain Congregational preacher 
is reported as having said to a family 
that would be a financial gain to the 
church, that they need not take the 
covenant at all if they did not want to. 
They did not need to quit dancing or 
playing cards and giving wine parties. 

I call up these things simply to show 
what extreme competition will lead to. 
I shall not waste time in depicting how 
much the church is trying to conform 
itself to the world — see how near it can 
be like the world and yet hang onto its 
title, often an empty sound — instead of 
trying to transform the world. 

From every^land of heathenism, and 
every city slum, and the great frontier, 
comes the cry for the gospel. Every 
missionary board is in debt and an- 
swers back, "We can't help you, we 
have no money." The missionaries are 
suffering privation and many people 
dying in sin for want of the word of 
life. All this is the result of denomi- 
nationalism. 

We all start for the wealthy portion 
of the wealthy and populous city, The 
result is a church for every few persons 
in some localities, while thousands are 
without the gospel. I believe there 
are some 480 persons to every church 
in this entire country. In our city we 
have a church to less than every hun- 
dred persons, while many adjacent- 
communities where a hundred people 
could be gathered, is neglected. 

I have left to your own idea who the 
poor are thus far in this article. I 
shall now define them. Jesus said that 



46 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



though he was rich yet for our sakes 
he became poor. He was poorly 
clothed, poorly fed, poorly housed, 
poorly thought of, poorly obeyed, poor- 
ly understood. 

Too poor to own a beast of burden, he 
must walk: too poor to pay inn-fare, he 
must sleep on the Mount of Olives; too 
poor to pay temple tax, he must work a 
miracle; too poor to own a grave lot, he 
was laid in a borrowed grave. The 
people of this country all call them- 
selves poor. But they are, most of 
them, not nearly so poor as ihey think. 
By the poor, I mean those who are not 
only short financially, but intellectual- 
ly, physically and morally. 

I mean that consumptive with no 
money, no health, no knowledge of the 
way of salvation. Who visits him? 
Who prays at his bedside? Who goes 
and ministers to his necessities? By 
the poor I mean the man who has lost 
his family, or who has lost hope, or has 
lost his manhood in a barroom, or his 
money in a gambling hell. Who looks 
after these men? I mean the men who 
in the hour of excitement have done 
some rash act. I mean the men who 
have been released from jail or the 
penitentiary. Who preaches the gos- 
pel to these? Who looks after them? 
Who says a kind word, or gives them a 
kind glance, or tells them the gospel is 
for sinners: that all have sinned: that 
Jesus came to seek and to save that 
which was lost? 

Ah. my friend, do we treat them as 
though heaven was for them? It is not 
what you tell them: it is what you do 
for them that makes them believe in 
you and your religion, and your God. 
and your heaven. It is your treatment 
;that brings hope or abandonment. 



"Deeds are fruits; words are but the 
leaves." 

By the poor I mean an unfortunate 
girl who has been driven by hunger 
and cold, to the bawdy house, or who 
has suffered betrayal at the hands of 
some vicious fiend who today walks in 
broadcloth, when he should wear prison 
stripes. Who seeks her? The vile 
only, that they may make her the 
more vile. 

Surely it is not the ladies(?) of the 
church who seek them and tell them 
of Jesus; who take them from the 
haunts of sin to their own homes and 
secure them respectable employment, 
and if they attempt -to escape, we give 
them the '"cold shoulder: 5 ' never bread, 
clothes or work. And if we have em- 
ployed such a person on our appre- 
hension they are at once discharged. 

I here append a sermon preached by 
Rev. Dr. Parkhurst of New York: 

Dr. Parkhuast's text was: ••Verily, 
verily. I say unto you that the publi- 
cans and the harlots go into the king- 
dom of God before you." — Matthew 21: 
31. 

The sermon was as follows: 

"This is one of those expressions of 
our Lord, become so familiar to us by 
frequent reading that we have ceased 
to appreciate its appalling audacity. 
We wish it were possible to witness the 
effect these quoted words would pro- 
duce. upon a community were they to be 
addressed to intelligences that had not 
been made callous by their constant 
repetition away back from the time 
when as children we began first to hear 
them. The circumstance which lends 
special meaning to these startling 
words of our Lord is the fact they were 
spoken in the hearing of, and indeed. 



THE POOR AND THE GOSPEL. 



4f 



that they were addressed to, the most 
eminently respectable element in the 
community: that is to say, he was talk- 
ing- to the chief priests and the elders. 
When we hear him saying to the ethic- 
al aristocrats of the people, and to the 
religious nobility that they had a lon- 
ger road to travel before they could be 
entered into the kingdo n of God, than 
the publicans and prostitutes, we no 
longer wonder that they crucified him! 
our only amazement is that they were 
so long about it. 

"The more cordially and unreservedly 
we give ourselves up to our Lord's 
meanings and intentions, the more 
thoroughly we become convinced of his 
intense radicalism. Radicalism is not 
a word that probably would find a great 
deal of favor with the majority of a 
congregation made up as this congre- 
gation is, but radicalism is the only 
word that will speak the thought I am 
trying to utter; only let us understand 
by radicalism, always not a headstrong 
and insane abandonment of the ground 
proper to be covered by intelligence 
and reason, but rather the pushing of 
intelligence and reason to the very ut- 
most of their possibilities, and getting 
clear down to the roots of the matter. 
That is what radicalism means — roots. 
It is in that sense that Jesus Christ 
was the most inconsiderate and ag- 
gressive radical that ever stirred soci- 
ety into irrepressible revolution. 
"his treatment of social outcasts 

" 'Verily I say unto you that the 
publicans and the harlots go into the 
kingdom of God before you. For John 
came unto you in the way of righteous- 
ness and ye believed him not, but the 
publicans and harlots believed him; 
and ye, when ye had seen it, repented 



not afterward that ye might believe* 
him.' It is necessary to complete our 
text by this addition of the verse fol- 
lowing in order -that no one may be left 
thinking that what are known as social- 
outcasts were dealt with by Christ in 
such tender consideration out of any 
indifference on his part to the sin- 
fulness of the life which they had been 
leading. He does not say that thef 
class here spoken of win easy entrance' 
into the kingdom of Heaven because* 
there is nothing inherently criminal in 
their habits and pursuits, but because- 
they submitted themselves to the doe- 
trine of righteousness preached by John 
the Baptist. They entered the Heav- 
enly kingdom easily because they re- 
nounced the unheavenliness of their' 
own way of living. 

"It is in precisely this way, also, that 
he treated the adulterous woman whose 
story is told in the eighth chapter of 
St. John's Gospel. He inflicts no harsh 
word upon her, bnt tells her neverthe- 
less that her sin must stop; and 
the necessary inference from the nar- 
rative is that when he speaks those 
gracious words, 'Neither do I condemn 
thee,' he means to say that the reason 
he does not condemn her is that he ex- 
pects that her sin is going to stop.- 
The story of all our Lord's dealings' 
with sinners leaves upon the mind the 
invariable impression, if only the story 
be read sympathetically and earnestly, 
that he always felt kindly toward the 
transgressor, but could have no tender- 
ness of regard toward the transgres- 
sion. There is no safe and successful- 
dealing with sin of any kind, save as 
that distinction is appreciated and 
made a continual factor in our feelings 1 
and efforts. 



4S 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



"how society weighs crime. 

"Now, society has a way of scaling 
crime and sins that it is pretty difficult 
to find a warrant for in the Holy Word; 
and a great deal of it comes from the 
difficulty of which men experience in 
keeping distinct things which are es- 
sentially different, and from confusing- 
things which are essentially distinct. 
One reason why we regard certain 
crimes as more wicked than others, is 
because the state punishes them more 
severely; but that is no safe criterion 
of their wickedness, inasmuch as what 
the state punishes a crime for is not its 
sinfulness, but its harmfulness to so- 
ciety; and it grades its punishments ac- 
cording to the degree of that harmful- 
ness. That is why it punishes forgery 
and counterfeiting, for instance, with 
more extreme penalty than it does pet- 
ty larceny. The criminality of a crime 
is according to the degree in which 
that crime is liable to injure society. 
The sinfulness of a sin is according to 
the degree in which that sin is an ex- 
pression of the sinner's indifference or 
antagonism to the will of God. So 
that the acts which will be most likely 
to land a man in jail are not necessarily 
the acts which will be most likely to 
land him in hell. 

"Another unwarranted class of esti- 
mates comes also from the fact that we 
put our weight of estimate upon the 
sins that we commit, and a totally dif- 
ferent' weight of estimate upon the .sins 
that we do not commit but that others 
commit. If a man is a thief he will al* 
ways have an indulgent side, not only 
for his own thievery, but for the thiev- 
ery of other thieves. If he is an adul- 
terer, he will be disposed to have the 
sin of adultery handled with cavalierly 
consideration. 



"You can very often reach a pretty 
accurate conclusion as to a man's life 
and habits by observing the laxity or 
strenuousness of his feelings and opin- 
ions touching any matter of sin tnat 
may chance to come up for discussion 
or treatment. And if his sentiments 
and judgments are lax, it is not neces- 
sarily because he wants to shelter him- 
self, but because he has been so habit- 
uated to some certain sin that the cor- 
responding set of moral sensibilities 
has become dulled and deadened. We 
feel keenly the wickedness of sin that 
it is neither our habit nor our disposi- 
tion to commit, Our rectitude is con- 
centrated at particular points along the 
ethical rectilinear. Our morality is 
bunched, and the bunches are separat- 
ed by long and numerous intervals of 
indifference and self-allowance. Con- 
siderable of the same is also due to ed- 
ucation. The home makes itself very 
powerfully felt in this way, we never 
recover from the impressions that in 
this respect were made upon us by pa- 
rental precept and influence. Opinions 
and tendencies win a set in the days of 
our childhood that is not likely to be 
neutralized and overcome by influences 
that operate upon us later. 

" 'CONTEMPTIBLE MEAXXESS" OF THE 

MALE SEX. 

"There are likewise drifts of sensi- 
ment current in society that tell upon 
individual judgments with the power 
of an almost irretible tyranny. One 
flagrant instance of that I will only 
suggest by reminding you of what you 
know so well that there certain offenses 
which if committee by one sex are tol- 
erated, but which if committed by the 
the other sex mean social ostracism. 
That particular matter Ls one which 



THE POOR AND THE GOSPEL. 



49 



when you have availed of your best 
philosophy, in order to its explanation, 
still leaves you confessing that the dis- 
tinction has its ground not in the will 
of God, but in masculine caprice; in the 
contemptible meanness of the male 
sex, which, in spite of all its boasted 
chivalry, thinks more of its own lusts 
than it does of feminine character, and 
unfortunately succeeds in constraining 
women to discriminate between a fallen 
brother and a fallen sister very much 
according to base man's own arbitrary 
criterion. 

"You perceive that there is a great 
deal in this matter of not getting down 
to the bottom of things, and estimating 
the case regardless of accidental influ- 
ences that operate with such tremen- 
dous effect to pull off our judgments 
from the main straight line. We 
could illustrate th3 same thing by tak- 
ing the instance of the man who ought 
to be in jail. You probably have ac- 
quaintances of that kind; not simply 
men who ought to be in jail, but men 
whom you suspect or even know ought 
to be in jail. Very likely there is not 
a social circle represented here this 
morning but would be measurably con- 
tracted if every candidate for prison 
distinction met his deserts. But the 
only point I want to make is that, while 
you will, quite probably, treat with 
courtesy and with social hospitality a 
man whom you have reason to believe 
criminal up to the moment when he 
dons the striped suit furnished by the 
State, you have no hospitality for him 
or anything else after the suit comes off. 
When I say "you" I mean society gen- 
erally. 

' 'no heart for an ex-convict. 

"Community at large has no heart 



for an ex-convict. And yet there may 
be just as much, of a man in him, indeed 
there may be more of a man in him 
after he comes out of jail than there 
was when he went in. 

"Out of 981 persons received at Sing 
Sing for the year ended September 20, 
1894, 99 were there for the second time, 
38 for the third time, 28 for the fourth 
time, and 11 for the fifth time. Besides 
that there were 277 men that had served 
from one to six times in penal institu- 
tions of some kind. 

"If you have ever talked with an ex- 
convict you know that one- great reason 
why he returns for the second, fourth 
or sixth time, is not because he is in- 
corrigible wicked, but the Church has 
no heart and society has no use for a 
man who has been in jail. Which 
taken in connection with the fact that 
society does tolerate and caress known 
criminals before they are lodged in jail, 
means that what society shrinks from 
most is not crime, but penal association; 
another of those arbitrary methods 
of procedure which are a reproach to 
society and a constant curse to the 
criminal. If your fellow falls into' a pit 
you will help him out; but if he falls into 
a moral hole and struggles to the sur- 
face society kicks him back. 

"There is a great deal of serious work 
that requires to be put in along this 
line. I know of a young woman, she 
has repeatedly been to my house, who 
had for a number of years been living a 
degraded life. Three distinct times she 
recovered herself from her abandoned 
ways and secured honorable employ- 
ment. In each instance she was recog- 
nized by some one who had known her 
in her old life, and information was 
carried to her employer that he had a 



50 



THE CHURCH QUESTION, 



dishonored woman in his service and 
she was set adrift . She is now under 
the care of friends, and is qualifying" 
herself for a career of Christian useful- 
ness. There is far more readiness on 
the part of this class of people to aban- 
don their profligate life than there is 
disposition on the part of the cheif 
priests and elders, scribes and, phari- 
sees and hypocrites to help them a- 
bandon it, and to extend to them an 
encouraging hand of Christian hospi- 
tality. 

"SOCIETY'S UNPARDONABLE SINS. 

"The scriptures tell us that thers is 
no unpardonable sin except the sin 
against the Holy Ghost, whatever ex- 
actly that sin may be. Society, on the 
other hand, says that there are several 
unpardonable sins, and that going to 
state's prison is one of them, and that, 
for a woman (not for a man, but for a 
woman) to transgress the seventh com- 
mandment, is another of them. Now. 
we are not trying to palliate the 
particular sin here referred to 
nor to apologize for it. but peni- 
tence for that sin is just as good, and 
means just as much, as penitence for 
any other sin. 

; •Penitence for that sin restored the 
fallen woman to the confidence and 
friendship of Jesus Christ, and why 
should it not restore such a one to our 
confidence and friendship. Are you 
going to impose harder conditions than 
he? Could he. without dishonor, re- 
ceive to his loving fellowship the re- 
turning prodigal son and the contrite 
daughter, and are any of us so surpass- 
ingly holy that what was pure enough 
for him to welcome is foul enough for 
us to repulse? There are a great many 
Magdalenes in the world, and a great 



many in this city, and some of them We? 
shall find by and by in the mansions 
prepared for them that love him: that 
is, we shall if we are good enough to 
enter any of those mansions ourselves: 
and how do you propose to get along 
with sainsed Magdalens up there if 
your unreasoning- and unsanctified fas- 
tidiousness prevents your receiving 
them upon tne platform* of sisterly" 
Christian equality here? 

''My woman-hearer, if you are a 
Christian, what makes you holy is that 
you have been washed in the blood of 
the Lamb: it isn't that you have always- 
been eminently respectable, that you 
have never' fallen . into ways of gross- 
depravity, never had an experience 
that is coarse and depraved; but that 
you have been washed in the blood of 
the Lamb. Now. if your fallen sister" 
has been washed in that blood, what 
affair is U of yours to let the foulness 
that was upon her before she was 
cleansed destroy for you the fact of her 
personal holiness now that she has been 
cleansed? You believe that the blood . 
of Christ has redeemed you: who are 
you that" you indulge the impudent 
thought that his blood is insufficient to 
redeem her?' And if she is one cf God's 
redeemed ones, what must it mean to 
the Redeemer that you gather your 
skirts around you in pious conceit, and 
shrink from' the contact of one who is 
as dear to the Lord as you. as holy in 
his sight, and as worthy of a crown and 
a heavenly welcome. 

••You remember the voice that spoke 
to Peter saying, 'What God hath 
cleansed that call not thou common. ' 
But •common' is exactly what you are 
calling some of these sisters whom God 
has vtea-nsed:' or' if 'you are not calling 



THE POOR AND THE GOSPEL. 



r,i 



them 'common,' you are thinking- -of 
them as common. You are practically 
denying the Lord's work in them. And 
not only that, but it is just the knowl- 
edge on their part, that that is the sort 
of Pharisaic inhospitality that you will 
show them that is keeping them from 
breaking forth from the bondage of sin 
into the freedom and the beauty of a 
virtuous and a Christian life. They 
believe that God will forgive them, but 
they know you won't. 

' 'only frosty sympathy. 

"I have had ample opportunity to 
know what these women say. I know 
or at least I have ground safely to con- 
clude, that there are thousands of them 
in this very city to-day who loathe the 
life they are in, but who shrink with 
even more of repulsion from the frosty 
sympathy and studied sisterliness of the 
women who dote on their own propri- 
eties, who have no interest in any prod- 
igals or Magdalens except such as are 
told about in the Bible, and who stand 
before the Lord in the self-centered 
complacency of the Pharisee, and pray 
Lord, I thank thee that I am not as 
other women are, or even as this adul- 
teress. The cry that comes up from 
them, when they are trying to fling 
their past behind them and reach forth 
in the felicities of a new and a virtuous 
life, is: 'But nobody is going to love 
me except with a condescending affec- 
tion, or rega'rd me with respect that is 
not three-quarters of it pity.' 

' 'They want to be all that is implied 
in that word womanly, and repenting 
of, and forsaking their sin, they want 
you should recognize them as being 
once more a woman among women 
standing with you upon a basis of wom- 
anly equality, and they have a right to 



have that longing of theirs met, and 
you don't meet it, and the consequence 
is they fall back again into their horrid 
ways, live dishonored, die dishonored;- 
their bodies are buried in the Potter's 
field, and their souls' go to the region 
whither your Pharisaic pitilessness has ; 
helped to drive them. When I say' 
'you' 'here I mean society generally./ 
and to what extent it is applicable to* 
the individual women here present you 
can decide for yourselves. 

'"Now the Scriptural authority for 
the demand here made that the peni- 
tent convict and the repentant Magda- 
len should be received back again into 
frank relations of conferred manly and 
womanly equality, is ail contained in a 
single feature of the story of the Prod- 
igal Son. The boy had gone to the ut- 
most bound of a depraved life. His ca- 
reer had not only been abandoned and 
lawless, but it had been coarse, and 
foul, and loathsome. That is part of 
the story and is to be counted in. And 
yet in all that there was nothing w r hich 
interfered to prevent his father's re- 
establishing him in precisely the same 
position in the household- that he had 
before "he went out. To the father's re- 
gard, the penitent abandonment of sin 
blotted out sin; made sin as though it 
had not been. The feature of the story 
is the unqualified cordiality of the 
father's hospitality. In reading the 
story you not only realize that the 
father carries himself toward the boy 
as he would do had he never gone 
astray, but that he feels -toward him as 
he would have done had he never gone 
astray. The past does not count. 
The past is rubbed out. It is as though 
it had never been. The older brother, 
though, punctilious, juiceless and love- 



52 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



less, not only cannot forget the prodi- 
gal's depravity, but it is the only thing 
about him that he can remember. The 
corrupt waywardness of the years he 
had spent away filled up the whole of 
his regard. That he was his brother 
made no difference. That he had put 
his wicked past behind him made no 
difference. That his father had de- 
clared that a position of equality in the 
household belonged to him as much as 
ever it did, made no difference. 

SOCIETY AND THE CHURCH. 

' : Now that older brother represents 
society to a dot. You have probably 
been so brought up on this story of the 
prodigal son that you have felt it to be 
a nice and beautiful thing that the re- 
turning penitent had his old place giv- 
en to him in the household. There is a 
good deal of current tenderheartedness 
bestowed on prodigals and Magdalens 
of a couple of thousand years ago, but 
prodigals and Magdalens living at this 
date have as a rule the same cold 
shoulder shown them as the elder 
brother showed to the penitent that 
came back from the far country. That 
is not saying that individuals are not 
dealing with these classes of people in 
the Lord's own spirit; but it is saying- 
society has no use for an ex-convict, 
and no heart for a fallen woman who 
has repented. No matter how thor- 
ough her penitence, or how complete 
the renovation of her life, she is a so- 
cial outlaw; and she knows it, and that 
is one principal reason why out of a 
hundred women who enter a depraved 
life, ninty-five die in it. Society, the 
Christian church, and the women of 
the Christian church help, in that way, 
to forge the chains that bind the poor 
creatures to their destiny and their 
damnation. 



"Now, in conclusion, let me only add: 
Don't accept this because I have' said 
it but go away asking yourselves just 
this one question: Is there anything 
in the presentation of the case made 
here this morning that runs counter to 
the intention of the gospel, or that con- 
tradicts in the slightest way either the 
preceptor the spirit of our Lord? If 
not, what are you going to do about 
it?" 

By the poor I further mean the chil- 
dren who have not the blessing of relig- 
ious homes, many of whom have no 
home at all — the street waifs. The ur- 
chins; black and white, that swarm the 
streets day and night, the creek bank 
on Sunday; that sleep in the alley and 
have not a change of clothes: that nev- 
er take off a garment until it wears off. 
Who cares for them? And yet these 
are to be the men of the nation. They 
are to wield both sword and pen in the 
days to come. Poor training and poor 
food make a poor manhood and a bad 
citizenship. Oh, that with warm 
homes, winter wraps and underwear, 
shoes and hats, some one would preach 
to the boys and girls homeless and 
helpless, the gospel of helpfullness! 
That some one would lead them from 
hunger, nakedness and sin, to food, 
clothing and Christ! 

Twenty thousand to forty thousand 
in some localities in New York City, 
and not a church! The poor don't 
have the gospel now-a-days. It costs too 
much. Think of Gordon. Talmage. 
Storrs. Taylor. Pierson. Kerr. Bishops 
Weaver. Warren. Hargrove and such 
men in little missions in these neglect- 
ed portions. Preposterous! Why? 
They couldn't pay them. Then the 



THE POOR AND THE GOSPEL. 



53 



missionary money is all wasted to get 
a foothold "uprtown" somewhere. 

Oh, for some business sense to do the 
business of the Lord's kingdom with! 
When population, not popularity, will 
call loudest for the gospel. 

If anyone was to go to these districts, 
it would be a "one horse" preacher. 
Someone like him who wields this pen — 
a boy from the street. Oh, when shall 
the poor cease to have the gospel poor- 
ly preached to them— poorly preached 
because of unlearned teachers; poorly 
preached because of inconsistent lives — 
if preached at all? When shall they 
see it preached by practice and in pro- 
found simplicity? Only when comity 
with all churches has obtained. When 
Christ, not creed, is the cry. When 
salvation instead of denominationalism 
is our aim. When there is a revolu- 



tion in the ministry and laity. Only 
when the lives of God's people become 
eloquent. When we are in the spirit 
on "the Lord's day," and when we re- 
cognize all days as his and are in con- 
stant communication with the author of 
our salvation. Oh, ye owls of denom- 
inationalism! cease your favorite hoot. 
Harken to the breath of the leaves. 
Learn a lesson from the aunt, the bee, 
the bird, the beast of the field, the 
brook, the bridge, the clouds and the 
clods. Gather some lesson for soul sick 
men. Preach the gospel of the king- 
dom. It is written every where; so 
plainly that he that runs may read. 
"Take the name of Jesus with you." 

"Go, teach all " "To seek first the 

kingdom of God and his righteousness, 
dnd all else will be added." 



1h% S£arg£ ttagstion, 



CHAPTER VI.— COMEOUTISM. OR NO-CHURCH. 



The doctrine of this peculiar set of 
people, known in this country as Come- 
outers, is primarily founded on the 
scripture "Come ye out from among- 
them and be ye separate." They are 
also called "Holiness," by reason of 
their extreme views on sanctification. 
They accept the New Testament only 
as the gospel, regarding the Old Tes- 
tament to be only a history. They dis- 
miss the ordinances in common with the 
Quakers, holding that they were abol- 
ished by the Savior. They are .firm in 
their belief in the Holy Ghost. But of 
the communion, they do not choose to 
do it •"in remembrance of Him." Of 
water baptism they disallow. They be- 
lieve in a divine call to the ministry, 
but have no ordained preachers. They 
pay no salaries; have no publishing 
houses, and build no houses of worship — 
because they never get strong enough. 
They support no colleges, "because it 
were folly to be wise.*' Their* work has 
been confined wholly to the ignorant 
and the poor, and one might add 
as poor as the objects of their ministry. 
As they pay nothing to the support of 
the gospel they have no missionary -o- 
eieties. 

They are either trusting to luck or the 
other denominations to carry the gospel 
to the uttermost parts of the earth, it 
is hard to tell which. The advantage 
this ism oilers is that there is no ex- 



pense attached to it. But this is a 
dangerous society, if society it could be 
called — for they have no formal organ- 
ization, though they always train in the 
same clan. This is a very serious affair, 
because it indirectly tends toward the 
overthrow of the church. 

Sectarianism, on the one hand and no 
church on the other, are the extremes. 
With regard to the doctrines of these 
people I shall say nothing here, only 
in so far as it affects the organized so- 
ciety of the church. 

The effect of such a society — or better 
such ideas, can have but one influence 
upon a community: that they are re- 
sponsible to no one and for no one. 

This notion of non-organization, when, 
carried to its limit means: no church: 
no state: no nation; no family: no subor- 
dination. The times in which we live 
are indeed perplexing. There are 
many with strong socialistic tendencies: 
and many others of strong anarch 
proclivities. 

Comeoutism is church anarchy. It is 
chaos. It is confusion. It is utter dis- 
solution of Christ's kingdom. 

Comeoutism is dangerous to every 
human enterprise. It is literally the 
supremacy of the individual. The 
church has often been afflicted with 
seceders. but rebellion against a certain 
form of government is far more to be 
desired, than rebellion against all gov- 
ernment. 



COMEOUTISM, OR NO-CHURCH. 



55 



They claim to give reverence and 
obedience to God, but the peculiar opin- 
ions that they held in regard to the 
scriptures make it impossible for any 
one to decide what course they will take 
in any matter. As may well be expect- 
ed they not only often differ among 
themselves, but seldom agree. Dispute 
follows dispute until it is confusion 
worse confounded. 

The origin of these religious Arabs is 
not definitely known. The doctrines 
that are held by most of them, is of 
widely different date. Some of them 
are but infants while others are as old 
as the Christian religion. 

They pride themselves on sanctmoni- 
■ousness; loud and long prayers and their 
' 'HOLINESS. " They have come with- 
in one step of Mrs. Eddy's doctrine of 
the unreality of sin by declaring it to 
be impossible for them to sin. Some of 
them hold to the old Budhistic theory 
of the transmigration of the soul; others 
"believe in a literal hell; while some 
believe in no hell at all. Some have 
had tragical experiences with the devil, 
while in the religion of others there is 
no devil. They would seem to 

think that the church of Jesus Christ is 
not like the human body. They see no 
relation of hand and foot, of ear and eye, 



of taste and smell. They do not seem 
to understand that the head needs a 
body as well as the body a head. 

I have devoted these few disjointed 
remarks to these people not for their 
sakes, but to show the unrest, rebellion 
and anarchy of the times, even in re- 
ligious circles. 

These, however are not the only 
circles where such things abound, nor 
is this the only country. 

Sorrow is sure to overtake us if we do 
not soon apprehend our relation one to 
another, and to God. The need of the 
world and men in general is to be 
brought in contact with the church. 
Christian versus society — a Christian 
state. We must vitalize, but we must 
also oi'ganize in order that we retain 
our vitality. Organization is taught 
by every plant, bird, and beast. Not an 
overplus of organization, but sufficient 
organization to accomplish a definite 
purpose of worth. Time would fail us 
to tell of the Followers, "Foot washers," 
etc., but as there is a dangerous ism 
stalking abroad under the double guise 
of science and religion, we shall take a 
few moments to tear off the mask ' and 
examine this thing of high title — 
Christian Science. 



2h% SfearBfe lagsfioD, 



CHAPTER VII. —CHRISTIAN SCIENCE CONSIDERED. 



The supreme authority of a Christian 
Scientist is Mrs. Eddy. Whatever she 
says is law and gospel. She is held in 
higher esteem than the Bible itself by 
the votaries of this new science(?). 

The first thing- to which I desire to 
call your attention is the title page of 
' ; The Christian Science Bible.'* Mrs. 
Eddy's work on science and health. 

It says "Mary Baker G. Eddy, presi- 
dent of the Massachusetts Metaphysical 
College. ' ' Now this sounds very large. 
It sounds very much as though the 
great state of Massachusetts had estab- 
lished and was maintaining this insti- 
tion. But not so. The college was 
chartered in 1881, and the first Christian 
Science association held on Centennial 
Day, 1876. The name of the state has 
been given to it because of its known 
reputation for learning. It is to catch 
the unwary. The truth is that it 
is only a little one-horse school near 
Boston with which the state of Massa- 
chusetts has no connection. As a so- 
ciety Christan Science is about twenty 
years old. Its growth has not been 
phenomenal. The census of 1890 show 
that in Massachusetts, where it origi- 
nated, there are 10 churches with 499 



* This lecture gives but a brief survey of the 
facts and falacies of this high-sounding society. 
For further investigatton see '"Facts and Fala- 
cies of Christian Scieuce; " "Christian Science 
Unmasked;,' "Christian Science Tested, and 
Scripture," and "Contradictions of Christian 
Science." the latter by the author of this volume. 



members, and but 22 churches in all 
New England, with only 803 members. 
True Mrs. Eddy has a church in Boston 
costing $200,000 seating- 13.000 people. 
This edifice- is from the contributions 
of the entire sect throughout the coun- 
try, and not the work of the Boston 
congregation. 

Christian Science is wholly revolu- 
tionary. It changes every vestige of 
. our thinking. It overturns all of our 
ideas of God. Christ. Satan and Sin. 
Christian Science is a strange medley 
of Pantheism. Spiritualism and L niver- 
salism. Well does Rev. S. W. Trous- 
dale. Ph. D., say: "It contains only a 
grain of gold in a mountain of rub- 
bish." 

Christian Science poses as both sa- 
vory and sanitary. 

Christian Science is not a system of 
clairvoyant practice, magnetic healing, 
faith-cure, nor even yet, strictly speak- 
ing, is it a system of mind-cure. Mrs. 
Eddy says: [Science and Health p. 11] 
"The theories I combat, stated fairly, 
are these: 1. that all is matter, and 2. 
that matter originates in mind, and is 
as real as mind, possessing intelligence 
and life." "The first named theory, 
that matter is everything, is quite as 
reasonable as the second, that mind 
and matter co-exist and co-operate. 
One only of the following statements 
can be true: 1. That everything is 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE CONSIDERED. 



57 



matter; 2, That everything is mind. 
Which one is it?" On the same page 
she says; "that mind is all and matter 
naught.' ' Further she says: "It is 
self-evident that this mind or divine 
principle, can produce nothing unlike 
itself, himself, herself. Sin, Sickness, 
Death, are comprised in a belief in 
matter, because spirit is harmonious. 
Everything inharmonious — sin sicklies 
death — is the opposite of spirit, and 
must be the contradiction of reality 
must be unreal." On page 15 she says: 
^'Matter was therefore not created BY 
mind, or FOlt mind."' 

' "The science of mind shows conclu- 
sively how it is that matter seemeth to 
be, but is not.'* "•Christian Science ex- 
plains all cause and effect as mental, 
and not physical." [p. IT.] 

Page 24: "Matter is neither thing 
nor person, but a human belief." Thus 
it is clearly seen that, with Christian 
Science the cure lies in the denial of 
the existence of the ill, instead of any 
treatment of it. 

THE TERMS DEFINED. 

Christian ^Pertaining to Christ or 
his religion. Professing Christianity 
or Christ-likeness. 

Science: Knowledge classified, and 
made available in work, life, or the 
search for truth, Any branch or de- 
partment of systematized knowledge, 
considered as a distinct field of investi- 
gation or object of study. 

We shall examine this matter; first, 
as to its scientific bearings, and later, 
in the light of Christian doctrine and 
the "Word of Truth." 

CONSIDERED AS A SCIENCE. 

(1.) Creation. "All things are cre- 
ated spiritually." "The divine princi- 
ple, not person, is the Father and 



Mother of man and the universe." — [S. 
and H. p. 139.] 

' 'What the person of God may be is 
of small importance when compared 
with the sublime question, "What is 
mind or divine power'?' " — [p. 110.] "In- 
finite impersonal Mind is the Creator, 
and creation is the infinite idea of his 
mind." 

"The Father of mind is not the Fath- 
er of matter. If so-called matter is 
substance, then Deity, matters opposite, 
must be shadow, and shadow cannot 
produce substance. From this it would 
follow that Spirit was not the creator, 
and that matter is self-created. This 
hethodoxy ultimates in the belief in a 
bodily soul and a material mind." — [p. 
141. 

Of He, who doeth has he will, she says 
on page 140; "A form or person is not 
equal to this infinite Love and Wis- 
dom. ' ' 

Had Mrs. Eddy said that Spirit (for 
God is a spirit) was the source of all 
original creation, we should have no 
harsh words, but when she says, "all 
things are created spiritually," I have 
somewhat against her. Where is. the 
spirituality (life, breath, wind) in gold, 
silver, iron, lead, stone — ad infinitum? 
"The Divine principle, not person." 
This is a favorite infidel expression. 
This is Hume's "Blind Force," Atheis- 
tic law. "Impersonal," and what would 
naturally follow, unintelligent "power" 
producing personal and inteligent re- 
sults. "Principle, not person. " 

On the next page she says: "What 
the person of God may be is of small 
importance, etc," "Infinite, inrperson- 
al mind is the creator." Will some 
psychologist please solve the problem 
of mind without personality ? "Imper- 



58 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



sonal!" Or will some one expiain how 
mind is never apprehended but by per- 
sons, or personality, consciousness of 
existence separate and apart from oth- 
er thing's? How is it that mind never 
apprehends itself until it apprehends 
something not itself V "If matter is 
substance, then Deity must be shadow." 
She asserts Deity to be the opposite of 
matter, then draws this conclusion. 
Now shadow is substance reflected. 
Matter is the fruit of the spirit. Mat- 
ter implies Gocl just as fruit implies 
trees. If God is infinite, then he is il- 
limitable. Personality means limita- 
tion only in the sense that there is 
something recognized as not a part of 
our own being. It has no reference to 
size, nature, power and wisdom; and it 
matters not whether it be Mrs. Eddy's 
"False supposition of a false sense:" 
"mortal mind'' or what not. so it is not 
of God as she claims of these things. 
The scripture declaring Him to be "All 
and in all" means that He is the sum 
total— the extract — of all goodness, 
power, wisdom and happiness. He is 
goodness boiled down. "God created 
all in the kingdom of mind, when He 
expressed in man the infinite idea, for- 
ever developing itself, broadening and 
rising higher and higher from a bound- 
less source. "' — [S. and H. p. 142.] Some 
one please tell us how to "develop the 
infinite higher and higher." '"Never 
born and never dying, it is an impossi- 
bility that man, under the govern- 
ment of Eternal Science to fall from his 
high estate." But a few years will be 
needed to prove the author of the state- 
ment either mistaken, not governed by 
"Eternal Science," or not having "an 
infinite range of thought" and whether 
or no in her case "a sick bodv is evolved 



from sick thoughts'' or whether "evil, 
disease and death arise from a wrong 
vision" [see S. and H. p. 143.} She 
will know the force of the scripture "a 
time to be born and a time to die." 

"When we realize that Life is spirit, 
and never in or of matter, that under- 
standing will expand into self-complete- 
ness— finding all in God, and needing 
no other communion." — [S. and H. p. 
144.] Here she denies the existence of 
life in the body. The blood is no more 
the life of the flesh. "The truth of 
things is perennial, and the error is seen 
only as we look from wrong points of 
view." — [p. 147.] 

The theory of this logiciani [?) is ob- 
vious. You must close your eyes if you 
are where you see faults. The remain- 
der of the chapter on creation contains 
some wise and good and even beautiful 
sentiment, but it is a peculiar failing of 
this lady theologician that when she 
announces an evangelical truth, she 
either prefixes or affixes — like a rider 
on a bill— some pernicious and deeep-. 
five statement. 

(2). As a Sanitary System.— 
"Physiology causes sickness, and then 
to cure it, recommends a double dose." 
— [S. and H. p. 193.] Webster says this 
science is the study of the processes in- 
cident to, and characteristic of, life. 
It is, further, of two kinds: animal and 
vegetable physiology. Mrs. Eddy says: 
"Physiology has, never explained soul. 
and better not undertake the explana- 
tion of the body. Life is. was. and ev- 
er will be. independent of matter." I 
suppose all things must thtii grow in 
mind only. Mrs. Eddy would not plant 
potatoes in the ground, but in the im- 
agination. Now how can a study of 
phenomenon affect the phenomena it- 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE CONSIDERED. 



59 



self? What influence would my study 
of the sun have to darken his smiling 
face or distend his spheric orb? Shall 
my ignorance of any occurrence make 

the thing the less real? "Admitting 
lhat matter (heart, blood, brains, the 
;SO-called five personal senses) consti- 
tute man, we fail to see how anatomy 
rcan distinguish between the brute and 
humanity, or determine when man is 
really man, and has progressed further 
•than his progenitors." Now, matter is 
tonly part of man, and shall Mrs. Eddy's 
'.stupidity destroy the science of anat- 
omy? 

"Physiology is anti-Christian. It 
teaches us to have other rulers before 
Jehovah. It would rob man of a God- 
given heritage." — [p. 171.] The lie is 
already branded on these statements. 
Jesus often told his disciples to come 
apart into a desert place and rest. Be- 
fore the feeding of the multitude Jesus 
said: "I will not send them away fast- 
ing, lest they faint in the way." — [Matt. 
15:32.] "But he said unto them, give 
ye them to eat." — [Luke 9:13.] "If 
there are material laws which will pre- 
vent disease, what then causes it?" 
'The answer is now on her tongue's end. 
"Violation of physical, as well as divine 
law, is sorrow to the transgressor. 
•"His flesh upon him shall have pain 
and his soul within him shall mourn." 
-—[Job 14:22.] The Bible nowhere says 
<that Christ cast out "error,"' as this fe- 
male theologician would have us think. 
'Christ healed the sick and cast out 
devils (demons). Mrs. Eddy would tell 
us that he "healed the sick * * * but 
never in obedience to physiology." 
When Jesus spat upon the clay and an- 
nointed the eyes of the blind, we have 
ithe use of a material agency applied by 



a person. "Mind is the source and 
condition of all existence." Hills and 
hollows; rocks and rivers, exist only in 
thought and not in reality. Indeed, 
the wheeling spheres, and spinning 
earth are so many revolving thoughts, 
and our life is but a dream, if Mrs. 
Eddy is correct. This system makes 
Metaphysics to oppose Physics, and its 
own vague theories and the dogmatic 
assertions of the author to be a suffic- 
ient disproof of all the experience of 
the past, and upon her own authority, 
renounces all the classified knowledge 
of all the fields of nature. Her disproof 
is like Hume's disproof of miracles: she 
first declares their non-existence and 
then argues that they can only be 
phantasy. As a science it is a classi- 
fied catalogue of falsehoods. Mrs. Eddy 
says: "Truth and error never mingle 
in Christian Science." If they do not 
it is because there is no truth to mingle 
with its superabundance of falsehood. 

Her disposition of physiology is sim- 
ple (in more ways than one) and easy. 
She declares the body to bo no part of 
the man, not even the house he lives 
in, or the instrument through which 
he manifests life: hence, the Heedless- 
ness of physiology. 

As a Curative, it is not only dan- 
gerous but disastrous. That the mind 
has an influence on the body no one but 
a Christian Scientist would disallow. 
The connection of mind and body is in- 
timato and the influence is that of the 
home on the inmates, and the influence 
of the inmates on the home. 

A crooked spine does not indicate a 
crooked mode of thinking, nor do sight- 
less eyeballs indicate a blind intellect. 
I quote from a valuable little work by 
Rev. W. T. Hogg, an offer made Mrs. 



60 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



Eddy by Prof. L. T. Townsend, D. D., 
of' Boston University, through the col- 
umns of Zion's Herald in 1884: He of- 
fered her $1000 if she and her entire 
college of physicians would reduce a 
real case of hip or ankle dislocation 
without manipulation and without 
touching it; and he further offered her 
$2000 if she and her entire college 
would impart sight to one of the in- 
mates of the South Boston Asylum for 
the Blind. She declined to make the 
test, on the ground that she was 

THEN ENGAGED IN ANOTHER DEPART- 
MENT OF CHRISTIAN WORK WHERE 
"THERE SHALL NO SIGN BE GIVEN 
THEM."' 

In declining, she also thanked the 
Professor, and assured him that were 
she to accept the challenge, he would 
lose his money, inasmuch as she had 
"performed more difficult tasks that 
these fifteen years ago." 

I assert fearlessly that Christian Sci- 
ence has not and cannot cure a single 
case of organic disease. There are a 
great many people cured of supposed 
maladies, cured with sugar pills or corn 
starch, but no case of broken limbs has 
ever been juggled into strength and 
usefulness. 

A few examples of their curative at- 
tempts will be in point here: 

Los Angeles, Cal., March 23. —Mrs." 
Ella Samis, the wife of a Whittier 
blacksmith, gave birth to a child two 
weeks ago. During her confinement 
she was denied the usual medical at- 
tendance and even skilled nursing, and 
a Christian Scientist alone prayed over 
her. After three days of this treat- 
ment a violent fever set in. Even then 
prayer still constituted the sole treat- 
ment. The woman died yesterday. 
Arrests will follow.— Press dispatch in 
McPherson (Kan.) Republican. 



Great excitement was recently crea- 
ted in Jamestown. Xew York, over the 
death of Mrs. Barrows, who was under 
process of treatment by the Christian 
Science people for the cure of a cancer. 
A Coroner's inquest was held over the 
body of the deceased, and the jury re- 
turned the following verdict: 

We find that Mrs. Barrows came to 
her death as the result of cancer of the 
breast, on the eighth dav of May. 1890. 
We also believe that contributory to 
this death was the culpable negligence 
of Mrs. M. J. Smith and Mrs. C. G. 
Lovejoy. who were advised of the na- 
ture of the fatal malady from which de- 
ceased was suffering, and failed to re- 
port or to advise treatment by any 
methods known to medical science. 
We further believe that W. A. Bar- 
rows was also negligent in not securing 
medical treatment for his wife when 
He had reason for believing she was in 
need of such treatment." 

Many of my readers may have seen 
an account of the death of Dr. Cowdry. 
an eminent Christian Scientist lecturer 
of Hartford, Connecticutt: 

"Christian Science can defy death." 
said the lecturer, and the challenge 
was at once accepted. He was instant- 
ly stricken of paralj-sis, never again to 
recover. 

Nor do we need to go from home to 
find systems of mal-practice by non- 
practice, through the sophistries of 
Christian Science. One Mrs. Julina 
Hueston, of our own town, was confined 
not long ago. The usual medical aid 
was denied her and she died. The 
Christian Scientists did the best that 
their sorcery could do. The citizens 
were enraged and the papers. Sentinel 
and Populist, condemned their action 
in severest terms. 

These are four of thousands. Chris- 
tian Science never cured anything, and 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE CONSIDERED. 



(if 



has made many a man to lie because its 
ehiei* moguls told him he must. 

As a system of metaphysics it is the 
height of insanity. 

CONSIDERED AS A RELIGION. 

Mrs. Eddy well says: ''Truth, inde- 
pendent of doctrines and time-honored 
systems, knocks at the portals of hu- 
manity. The only guaranty of obedi- 
ence is a right apprehension of Him. 
whom to know is life eternaL" 

I want you to notice the pronoun 
used — Him. A right knowledge of 
Him — a person — is the very thing this 
system lacks, and in lacking that it 
lacks everything. 

"Ignorance of God is no longer the 
stepping stone of Faith." — [Preface S. 
and. H.] Ignorance has always been 
the stepping stone to sin, not to faith. 

"For whosoever calleth upon the 
name of the Lord shall be saved. 
How then shall they call on him in 
whom they have not believed? and how 
shall they believe in him of whom they 
have not heard? and how shall they 
hear without a preacher (herald or 
messenger)?" — [Rom. 10:13-1*.] 

"So then faith cometh by hearing 
(evidence), and hearing by the word of 
God."— [Rom. 10:17.] 

We have already spoken of God as a 
"Principle" or "Blind Force." Mrs. 
Eddy rejects the doctrine of the Trini- 
ty, and yet in her notes on Genesis 1:1. 
she says; "The Eternal Verity and 
Unity of God. The creative principle — 
Life, Truth and Love— is God." Now if 
this impersonal Principle to become 
God according to this system is not be-- 
come a Tri-Unity of elements — Life, 
Truth, Love — my comprehension is de- 
fective. 

On pages 377 and 378 of Science and 



Health, we find the following: "God- 
is Mind. He is divine principle not 
person." "God is Soul, or Spirit, and 
spirit hath no outline. Soul is neither 
a limited mind nor a limited body;: 
therefore it cannot be a person." 

On page 393 we read: "We cannot 
bring out the practical proof of Chris- 
tianity that Christ required, while- 
error is as potent and real to us as 
truth, and while we make a personal 
devil and a personal God our starting- 
points." 

God is represented in scripture as a 
Father with property which he rents 
to his husbandmen; with mansions in his 
house; with eyes that see so that not a 
sparrow falls without his notice. "He 
is a spirit, [John 4:24];" "a husband- 
man, [John 15:1];" "Father, [Matthew 
6:9];" "Taught of God, [1 Thess. 4:9]." 
Conceive if you can-an "impersonal" in- 
structor. "Inspirer of the scripture, [2" 
Tim. 3:16];" "Moses was admonished of 
God, [Heb. 8:5]." Whoever heard of 
"impersonality" admonishing an indi- 
vidual? 

Christian Science denies repeatedly 
that God is a person, which is the quint- 
essence of Atheism. 

God is asserted to be all, and that 
that is not God is not at all. 

"God is Mind." "Man is the idea of 
God." Hence man cannot be different 
to, nor separate and apart from God. 
If there is no God separate from man, 
then man is God, and why indulge in 
prayer? a thing in which they claim to 
believe. 

On page 501: "Jesus was the offspring 
of Mary's self-conscious communion 
with God. Hence, he could give a 
more spirited idea of life than other 
men, and could demonstrate the science 
of Divine Principle." 



THE CHURCH QUESTION. 



••Jesus is the man and Christ is the 
divine principle of the man." — [p. 408.] 
''Christ — Divine Principle: soul — out- 
side the body: not the person of the man 
Christ Jesus, but his Eternal Spirit." 
-[ P . 530.] 

The trouble is they make him a man 
and nothing- mere than a man. for in 
this system all men are Spiritual and 
Eternal. This is ing-enius blasphemy. 

Their treatment of the Holy Ghost — 
Holy Spirit— is so self -contradictory, so 
utterly inconsistent as to have no place 
in this lecture. 

Their treatment of the scripture is 
also barbarous. They accept only that 
that they are able to pervert, and re- 
ject the remainder, as said of man and 
not of God. Hence there are but about 
twenty-seven books that they accept of 
the entire sixty-six: and they also re- 
ject a part of the books that they claim 
to accept. For instance. Genesis, the 
first chapter, they accept after etheri- 
alizing it. and reject the second as 
earthly. Strange this revelation has 
been kept secret from the apostles till 
1866. 

I shall now close with a summary of 
the principles of this science.(?) 

Bishop J. Weaver D. D. said: "There 
is nothing in it." "It has no handle to 
it.*' 

1. God is all, God is good: therefore" 
all is good: hence there is no evil. 

2. God is all. God is spirit: there- 
fore all is spirit: hence there is no mat- 
ter. 



3. God is all. God is perfect: there- 
fore all is perfect: hence there is no 
imperfection, no misery, no sickness, 
only that which seems to be so. 

Or. to put it in another form: 

1. 'The Divine mind (an impersonal, 
universal Mind) is the only reality. 
Hence: 

2. Matter is unreal — the false sup- 
position of a false sense. 

3. Individual mind has no existence. 
All mind is one and indivisible. 

4. There is no such ethical reality 
as evil. What seems so is only invert- 
ed thinking. 

5. There is no such being as a per- 
sonal God — no God apart from universal 
mind. 

. 6, The Bible is no more an inspired 
book than Mrs. Eddy's Science and 
Health — in fact is less reliable as a rule 
of faith and practice. 

More briefly still: 

God is everything — the sum total. . 
Therefore everything is a part of God. 
God is good, wise, eternal, spiritual: - 
therefore all else is so. 

This is the blasphemy of nothingism. 

Suffice hero tq say in conclusion, that 
this scienceC? )is born of Satan — Born to 
deceive man in his reality, and to 
wreck their faith in God that he may 
••take them captive at his will." - 



Note. — On creation, see the first lecture in 
this volume, and the second lecture on the na- 
ture and life of Jesus. 

A complete analysis of this subject will be is- 
sued by January i. 1896. 



Signs of ffie Eldes, 

SOCIOLOGICAL. 



Lesson, Proverbs 8. 

Text, Matthew 7:4, "Let me pull out 
the mote out of thine eye."' 

We live in an era of social and polit- 
ical criticism, an age of excessive 
fault-finding. Like the poor, we have 
the fault-finders with us ever. 

There are people who seem to have 
nothing else to do: at least they do 
nothing else. 

Sore-headed politicians complain of 
the officers; backslidden professors 
complain most about the pastor, and 
the man who has been disbarred has 
the least use for the legal fraternity. 

It is the man or the woman who has 
never had religion enough to last them 
more than through preaching — while 
the preacher has the floor— that are 
ever raising the standard of spirituality 
for the church— people who have neith- 
er grace nor sense who are always talk- 
ing about their neighbors. 

It is the man who knows ''nothing of 
medicine in particular," who seems to 
know everything in general. 

It is the parent who knows nothing 
about a school who is always telling, 
"how I would teach." 

It is the man who knows nothing of 
business who tries to run everybody's 
business. 

It is always "the other printer" that 
can find the most mistakes in a "job." 



The baker that is loafing that can. 
make the "best bread." 

It is the man that is out of a job that 
always finds fault with the work. 

"Let me pull out the mote out of 
thine eye." 

A few soft headed people, with less 
than a thimble full of brains, want to 
run the weather business. They want 
to teach him "that maketh a decree for 
the rains and a way for the lightnings 
of the thunders," how and when to 
make such decrees. 

Then, there are a few swelled-heads 
— you grocerymen know what that 
means. It means there is something in 
the can. Well it means the same 
in heads. There is something in them — 
GAS. Well, those fellows want to make 
God and the people — especially the 
PEOPLE — to think that they are smart. 
so they try to tell us how the world 
should, or could, or might, have been 
redeemed without costing anybody any 
sleepless nights, or blood, or sorrow, 
not to say life, and that, the life of more 
than mortal. 

Then scepticism comes up and places 
its lever under one side of the old cube 
of truth — the bible — and says, "We 
will upset the whole thing." "Let me 
pull out the mote out of thine eye." 
But Herbert Spencer comes up just in 
time — he is always in time— to save the 
painful, operation and say ''unknown 

61 



64 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



and unknowable," while these scien- 
tists are parleying. Jesus says, "Go 
wash in the pool of Siloam." 

It is related that when the gods had 
determined to engage in the work of 
creation, Jupiter made a man, Neptune 
a bull. Minerva a house. Momus stand- 
ing by. found fault with the man be- 
cause he had no window in his breast, 
with the bull because its horns were 
not under its eyes, and with the house 
because it was not upon wheels so that 
its inmates might more away from un- 
pleasant neighbors. For this Momus 
was cast out of the divine councils and 
has ever since been with us. 

I am glad God did it as he did. I 
think Mark struck the keynote when 
he said, "He hath done all things 
well.'* (Mark 7:37.) "Thanks be to 
God for his unspeakable gift." (2 Cor. 
9:15.) 

Do you know what some seed bulbs 
do? When they get ripe they fly open 
and empty themselves. You know 
what happens when a swelled head 
"busts" — there is an explosion and then 
it smears everything around and be- 
neath it with its smurch. 

That- is the swell of scepticism and 
the "bust" of atheism. They are so 
ripe — in the sense that a boil ripens — 
that they "bust" so badly that they 
cannot even contain ideas — not even 
great, large ideas, as God, eternity and 
personal responsibility. All they have 
is a few dry dogmas and smutty stories, 
which have dried fast to the walls — 
shattered walls — of these noble(?) heads 
and they want to pull motes out of peo- 
pled eyes, and behold, a beam is in 
their own eye. 

There is some good in every man. 
Don't fuss at him all the time, develop 



the latent good. A good illustration of 
this may be found in the gum candy 
man: His shape depends on the pres- 
sure to which he is subjected. 

"Any fool can be a critic," said Mr. 
Moody. 

It is always our misfortune that we 
can correct others easier than our- 
selves. 

This is an age of criticism. Do you 
know what becomes of critics when 
they go to seed? They become cranks. 
This is a generation of critics, and 
what shall the harvest be? There are 
multitudes who. while they do nothing 
themselves, are clever in criticizing 
the workingmen. 

A Russian fable tells of a wise swine 
named Kavron that found its way into 
the court yard of the palace of the 
king, where it roved at will from the 
kitchen to the stable. On its return, 
Kavron was asked. "What have you 
seen? I have heard that kings' palaces 
are filled with wealth and beauty, that 
there are fair pictures and splendid 
tapestries, and pearls and diamonds 
everywhere." " 'Tis all false," said 
Kavron; "I saw no splendor: nothing 
but dirt and offal." 

If we proceed in the same manner. 
we shall also reach a like result. We 
may go into the back yard of a man's 
character and find all kinds of noisome 
pestilence, or we may go into the front 
garden and bear away with us the per- 
fume of his virtues. 

Be careful what you do to a man's 
eyes. It is a delicate matter to pluck a 
mote from an inflamed eye: either of 
the human body, body politic, or the 
social body. You can't use coal tongs 
for such work. 



SOCIOLOGICAL. 



05 



UNREST. 

This is a period of unrest — mental, 
political, financial, social and ecclesi- 
astical. It would not take a twenty- 
penny spike in your eye to disturb your 
rest. This is a time when every man 
seeks his neighbor's goods, not his 
neighbor's good. The world has slept 
so soundly, so hard that it has awakened 
with the headache and its eyes distort- 
ed. It is troubled with anaesthesia. 

We have sown the cause and are har- 
vesting the effect. 

The Book says: "In the last days 
perilous times shall come." They are 
here! They are here! 

Things don't happen. Ill fitting 
shoes produce corns. 

Bad home training makes bad men. 

You talk about other people when 
their backs are turned, and ten chances 
to one they will talk about you when 
your back is turned. 

There never was a time when social 
evil, with its thronging horrors, was 
more prevalent than now. 

There never was a time when Chris- 
tian marriage was more lightly es- 
teemed than now. The air is full of 
clamor for freedom of choice and free- 
dom of renunciation, and heavy with 
discord and discontent. 

We outlaw strong drink and keep 
the drunkard. 

We give.no quarter to a social vice 
that thrives in every quarter. 

"To get rid of rascals we must quit 
raising them." — Holland. 

We preach against extravagance in 
the finest clothes we can buy, and 
against hypocrisy while trying to carry 
out the old' story of the spider and the 
fly, and then charge our poor name and 
poorer pocket book to misfortune, or 



bad luck, or ill health, or anything, or 
anybody but ourselves. We even 
charge our weedy corn to providence, 
never laziness. 

Formation and not reformation of 
character is the need. 

Had as much money been spent in 
Sunday schools as in political reforms, 
the millenium would have been here 
long ago. 

JUSTICE. 

We are pretty much in favor of meas- 
uring a man's corn in his own selling 
measure. 

We like to do as we are done by, and 
leave God out. We want the privilege 
of doing as we please with him, but we 
have then only half filled the Golden 
Rule. ' 

The law of recompense does not wait 
to be fulfilled. "Whatsoever a man 
soweth that shall he also reap." 

The Golden Rule CAN be made inex- 
orable, "As ye do unto others, so shall 
ye be done by. 

We often pray, "Forgive us our debts 
as we forgive our debtors." There is 
a world of philosophy in that word 
"as." 

Take heed! "With what judgment 
ye judge ye shall be judged, and with 
what measure ye mete it shall be meas- 
ured to you again." 

Haman is ever on the way to the gal- 
lows he built for Mordecai. 

Be careful how you utter that prayer 
if you are of a sour and unforgiving 
disposition, or censorious spirit. You 
are all ready to say, "Brother, let me 
pull out the mote. " But God help ev- 
ery one of us — help me and may this 
people help me to pull out the beam. 

FAULT-FINDING. 

Do you want to know why we com- 



66 



SIGXS OF THE TIMES. 



plain so much? I will tell you. You 
think you know so much. 

You have faith in your own self-con- 
ceited head, but none in God. You 
have not quenched your thirst — your 
thirst for pleasure, for fame, for money, 
for blood — with the water of life. You 
complain too much. •"But church 
members complain." you say. So do 
men in the Held get thirsty, with a 
splendid fountain of crystal water in 
the front yard, because they have £ one 
away from it. 

Oh for less fountains of show and more 
"riyers of waters 75 — great streams of 
love and gratitude to God for the beau- 
tiful landscape, the sweet melody of 
song, the sculpture of the mountains, 
the millinery of the birds, the dress of 
the beasts, the architecture of the bees, 
the dazzle of the noonday, the fresco of 
the evening sky. the glitter of the 
night canopy, the silver lining of the 
morning clouds, the odor of the jessa- 
mine, the spotless beauty of the lillies, 
the quiet of an humble home, the af- 
fection of faithful friends, and more, 
for the privilege and the capacity to 
enjoy them. 

'•Oh. tba: men would praise the Lord 
for his goodness and for his wonderful 
I men." 

But - an see n< ihing for 

which to be thankful. They arc al- 
Their stomachs trou- 
ble them. Their liver does not act 
- will persist in eating 
cold potatoes, cucumbers, hard boiled 
orgs until they can 

see nothing in the world i akful 

about. 

Do you know whom I am after? 
These corner politicians, these 

gutter snipes, these men who sit on 



goods boxes by the hour and spit at a 
mark, who can't get woee and whom 
work can't get. who keep a fire built 
under their red noses most of the time, 
and who practice quite often Paul's 
saying to Timothy. ' 'a little wine for 
thy stomach's sake." Do you know 
why'.-' They have so colored their 
glasses by this self abuse that they can 
neither see nor feel aright. Their 
minds and bodies are full of pain — un- 

THANKFUT,. 

I am glad God gave me a mind and 
the privilege of using it. Thankful 
that I have . t rague. Ladies for men 
of course, seldom find use for them 
should be thankful for tongues. I am 
glad that I am not a rabbit to be 
hunted by dogs, or a quail to be torn 
by shot, or an ox to be beaten abo 
I see some of you doing. 

I think we need t.vo new societies in" 
this place, one to protect animals from 
oar cruelties, and the other our foil 
from cur cal Let me pull th« 

mote oat tola, 3ye! 

Iamthankfu Eor the privilege of 
trying t teach your boys how to be- 
have themi slvesl Thanki 

kin Leal y ar home:. Th 

vol . ..." . '._.:/.;_'." 
life." 

Thankful "or the ° 3sus 

first, I - 

wis 
showed love for ma — jus. the uu- 

- • ■ 
PEOPLE IN GLASS - - NOT 

THROW STONES. 

1" 1 rant : .. a word to 
chronic grumblers. I expect you can 
think of all of th _ " " 

hood excepl - N 



SOCIOLOGICAL. 



m 



suit you and, what is worse, you suit 
nobody. Say (confidentially) don't you 
get sick of yourself sometimes? Of 
course we all hope for the time when 
all of the best things shall be common, 
but we have some lessons to learn first. 
We hope for the time when men will 
seek justice, not charity, but it will not 
come until we have learned self-com- 
mand and self-surrender. To take up 
our cross — burden, part in the affairs 
of life: Daily, Self-sacrifice, obedience, 
endurance. 

I have no sympathy with grumblers. 
They make themselves and everyone 
else uncomfortable. Corley says: 
"When men hunt rabbits, they usually 
find rabbits." So with men hunting- 
faults. 

Government as we have it is the 
work of human intellects, and of course 
it is faulty. Officers are men, and they 
make blunders. So do you. 

Occasionally one is dishonest. Would 
you be any less so? 

Good men make mistakes. Do not 
you? 

One of your great mistakes is judg- 
ing, rather, mis-judging. "Let me 
pull the mote out of thine eye, and be- 
hold, a beam is in thine own eye.n' 

Do not preach temperance with a 
flask in your pocket. Do not advocate 
social purity while your lips are blis- 
tered by the telling of unclean tales. 
Do not pra£e about political reform if 
you stayed away from the polls last 
election, or about hard times if you 
have spent your money for drink and 
tobacco. 

If God has so honored humanity as to 
come to it as "the carpenter's son," 
man must be of great dignity, and jus- 
tice to him will be reverence and hom- 
age to God. 



But our ideas of justice are so differ- 
ent. It is always changing its mean- 
ing. Justice in one age is cruelty in 
the next. 

It was once "justice,' to hang a man 
for a word; to jail a Bunyan twelve 
years for preaching the gospel; to send* 
eight year old childrdn to work in fac- 
tories. 

It has been called ''justice" to make 
high prices and low wages, but they 
call it "business" nowadays. But the 
circle is widening, and who shall say 
but that eight hours a day will be ac- 
corded to miners and mechanics with 
as much enthusiasm as it has been de- 
nounced? Women onee worked In the 
pits eight hours a clay, dragging coal- 
trucks by chains fastened around their 
waists, but it will not be endured now. 
Capital should be to labor as the ex- 
ponent to a letter — to raise its power: 
Combinations were once illegal, and 
even now they vex and harass the la- 
borers. 

Societies of workingmen arc as much 
for the public safety as for the advan- 
tage of the laborers themselves. With- 
out them it is the old story of the Pa- 
tricians in their usurpations over the 
Pleabes. 

If the trades unions do wrong punish 
them for it. 

If capital and congress shall be just 
with workingmen, they must be just 
with each other. 

Intimidations at elections are no 
worse for having been in Ireland than 
in America; or the boycotting, molesta- 
tion or intimidation of our fellows, who 
will to eat bread in the sweat of their 
face. For God's word says: "If a man 
will not work neither shall he eat." 

It would be gratifying if every one 



68 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



would do just as we see tit. If every 
work, c ould save for a rainy 

day: parents ail become enthusiastic 
,0 children's education; our neigh- 
bors be truthful: the voters all go to 
- and every one attend public 
blip. But we do not so find things, 
and here comes one with an old red 
bandana, saying, "Let me get the mote 
public eye." Another, with 
nn-washen hands and a bale of 
ider his arm, says. "Let 
e mote."' Then some one 
- : i >nies running with a basin of wa- 
i ying, ' 'Water: water is the thing. 
. e get out the mote."" Then Shy- 
2 of the old story of the 
sec .-..._ away Impurities from 
says: "Stand buck, put in a 
- j-ar the vision. Let 

ME pull the mote. 19 Who art thou 
— judg . st another: For in that thou 
fchou condemnest thy- 
self, j doest the same thing. 

Is the trouble? Too many 
Doctors! No wonder we can't see the 
outco. ; se things. It isa wonder 

a e can see anything. 

- great many people in the 

. who desire to call attention to 
- "mote" ie keep their own 
"beam" from being seen. Your neigh- 
- .vashing looks dirty through your 
window, and you will malign her by the 
tier untidiness and never sus- 
. 3 our own window needs wash- 
ing. This - Lily true in soc 
politics, and religion. 

You try to hide behind the faults ol 
others. Do you know what Jesus said 
on such an occasion? "He that is with- 
out sin let him cast the first stone at 
her." (Jno 8:7.) Do yon think that 
means the justification of adultery? 



Never; Do you remember the young 
man that asked Jesus what he must do 
to inherit eternal life, and then went 
on telling all of the good things that he 
had done? Jesus said, "One thing thou 
lackest. " So it is with you. You are 
not faultless, behold "a beam is in thine 
own eye." Faultfinding is a disease. 
Faultfinding is at the base of all our 
trouble. It tends to dishonesty. If you 
hear a man seriously criticizing every- 
body you may be sure something is 
seriously wrong with him. and it may 
be in his head, but he is trying : 

drown the voice of his c - e by 

basely beating the base-drum oi s 
one else's band. 

what k the way i > stal 

o; affairs? 

"Stand still and see the sah .. 
the Lord." 

We want a genuine revival There- 
is tot much hypocrisy in the pulpit, too 
much hypocrisy in the pc 
school room, in commerce, in - 
in the home. Now just stand still and 
keep your tongue for twenty-i 
as with a bridle. Just stop your -wear- 
ing and fussing, and faultfinding and 
lying for a little while, and I will ven- 
ture the assertion that a ... hord in 
your nature will be struck, and a new 

d your nature sounded, a 
you are conscious of it yoi 
sing "Depths of Mercy ea 
Mercy still reserved forme'" and 
then the words of that song • sing £ 
much will begin to ring in your ears 
"Sinners Jesus will rec* 
word of Grace to aUL v 
waiting one minute you will begin to 
sing "Jesus f sot And by 

the time you have sung 
grace with thee is found' 



SOCIOLOGICAL. 



69 



saved man — saved from sin: from throw- 
ing stones through your own window 
panes at other people; saved from op- 
pressing the poor; saved from giving 
short measure and light weight; saved 
from laziness, you can't be lazy and re- 
ligious. (Bro Brooks at Garden City 
Kansas read "stubborn and religious" 
for "stubborn and rebellious"] saved 
from a sour stomach and a sourer will, 
and you will let your voice raise toward 
heaven "I am thine Oh Lord." God 
hasten the blessed reconciliation and by 
the tender hand of love remove both 
"mote" and '•beam." 

PERORATION. 

There is a little church in Lucerne, 
whose principal attraction is an organ, 
and every day during the summer 
months it is played for the benefit of the 
visitors. On each occasion the ear is 
regaled with the music of an Alpine 
storm. A man has only to be suscepti- 
ble to musical impressions, and to shut 
his eyes to hear the rising and moan- 
ing wind c which preludes the thun- 
der-burst; then the lightnings play and 
shunders echo from peak to peak, and 
the world seems overwhelmed by an 
army of demons. Then, while he lis- 
tens the great procession sweeps by. 
The thunders which were sharp, die 
into a distant roll. The wind ceases, 
the sound of the rain grows fine, and at 
last the sun breaks forth and all is 
peace and light. Then coming from 
afar, as if the music were born of heav- 
en itself, he hears that which is the 
organ's glory, its VOX HUMANA, in a 
chant of thanksgiving. His heart 



swells, his eyes are filled with tears. 
He forgets all the grandeur and glory 
of the thousand pipes through which 
the storm manifested itself to him, in 
this feeble, distant, human voice, which 
speaks the praise of his Maker. He 
forgets trumpets, and viols, and flutes, 
and diapasons, and all the thunders 
that rolled under the feet of the organ- 
ist, in the breathing of this one stop, 
because it is the best in the organ, if 
not the best in the world. 

Don't throw stones. Humanity is 
one, and the breath of power which 
sweeps through it is divine. Every 
man's form of power is a stop in the or- 
gan, and there is really nothing more 
admirable in the trumpet than in the 
flute, nothing finer in the aboe than 
in the flageolet, and nothing so won- 
derful in the whole instrument as the 
simple voice of humanity. The great 
desideratum is perfection \n the stop, 
whatever it may be. To make these 
stops perfect — to shape them so that 
they shall entirely express the power 
which the Creator breathes into us, 
and breathes through us, is the crown- 
ing work of our lives. 

When the little stops become as good 
as the great ones, and the great ones 
have reached perfection; when none of 
them are either dumb or out of tune, 
then shall the anthem of human tri- 
umph sweep round the world, and heav- 
en will look on in wonderment. 

Counsel, not criticism, is most proiit- 
able. 



Note:— This sermon was preached at Tecum- 
seh, O. T., about the time of the Chicago strike. 



ttfODS Of ffig «Fffi2BS. 



the drought. 



"The world had much of strange and wonderful, 
In passion, much; in action, reason, will. 
And much in Providence, which still retired 
From Human eyes, and led philosophy. 
That ill her ignorance liked to own. through dark 
And dangerous paths of speculation wild. 
Some thinking features as we pass we mark. 
In order such as memory suggests." 



Lesson, Deuteronomy 11:8-22. 

Text. Proverbs 13:15. 

Law is everywhere active, but all ef- 
fects to be derived from the action of 
law are conditioned. Meterological 
law is conditioned. We must ignore 
neither the law nor its conditions. Ef- 
fects differ often tho' the law never. 
The conditions change. Of- course God 
is ever the same: he causes it to rain 
on the just and the unjust — where they 
are all mixed up together — but if it 
were not for the just, the unjust would 
see more clearly the force of the text. 
"The way of the transgressor is hard.'' 
God deals with nations, much as he 
does with individuals. In the past he 
has humbled the wicked; he has caused 
the spreading green baj tree to pass 
away, and dense cities to be turned in- 
to habitations of bats and owls. 

Is there any reason for believing 
that God has abandoned the universe 
or that he has ceased to take an inter- 
est in things that concern humanity? 
Has he abandoned the earth to luck or 
to fate? No. 



'•There is a Divinity that shapes our ends, 
Rough hew them though we may." 

Transgress means, literally. £k towalk 
over"'. The transgressor is one who 
walks over law, either human or divine. 
This individual or nation will find no 
easy time though things may seem to 
run smoothly for a lime. I say of a 
truth, there is no prosperity without 
rightousness. 

AS APPLIED TO THE INDIVIDUAL. THE 
WAY OF THE TRANSGRESSOR IS HARD. 

But some one will say. 'T know a 
number of very wicked men who are 
very prosperous in their business— they 
are making money. "' That is no proof 
of rightousness. Some good people are 
very poor. This is true, but "The lit- 
tle that a righteous man hath is better 
than the riches of many wicked" "Bet- 
ter it a dinner of herbs where love is 
than a stalled ox and hatred there- 
with. " 

The trouble is you don't know how fco 
count success. "What will it profit a 
man if he gain the whole world and 
lose his own soul? If these men pros- 
per how do they do it? Have you test- 



THE DROUGHT, 






ed their scale weights, their yard stick 
their half-bushel? Then you misjudge 
the righteous often. 

You don't know all about that "poor 
good man." It may be he can't stand 
prosperty. God knows he would not be 
good if he was not poor. Men when 
they prosper become self-relient, proud 
boasters, covetous, blasphemers. 

The way of the transgressor is hard 
on: 1. His finances. 2. His health. 
3. His reputation. 4. His family. 5. 
His mind. 6. His morals. 7. Soci- 
ety. 

No man need be deceived on any of 
these propositions. 

1. If you would know how hard the 
way of the transgressor is examine sta- 
tistics of the rum traffic and the tobacco 
sales, which amount to far more than 
the bread and meat bills of the country. 
If you would get a further glimpse in- 
to the financial side of the transgres- 
sor's difficulties, compute the physi- 
cians fees of the entire world. If you 
would further know this lesson, look at 
his mortgaged home, lean horses, half- 
clad children, and tattered coat. He 
goes to town with ''fourteen dollars on 
his inside pocket" and comes home with 
a black eye. 

But the way of the transgressor is 
hard on his health. Take the hospital 
record; read the medical journals; talk 
with your family doctor. What means 
this pain in your head, or back, or 
limbs? You say it is rheumatism or 
sick headache, or something of the 
sort. Why this wheezing when you 
walk, or coughing all night? You say, 
asthma or consumption. Oh no! no!! 
no!!! no!!!! ' It is, It is sin! The way of 
the transgressor is hard. 

You have walked over the invisi- 



ble, eternal, immutable laws of God and 
health. All these coughs and colds, 
the fevers, and eruptions; all these 
aches in your head, and back: that 
coated tongue and glassy eye tell the 
story— they prove my text: "The way 
of the transgressor is hard." 

Boys, girls, keep good hours. Late 
hours are bad on your health. But 
they are also hard on your reputations. 
You can't afford to keep late hours. 
You are no account the next day. It 
is not showing the lady proper respect. 
I know you enjoy the company. But 
your present pleasure is always your 
ruin. There are also business laws 
that we must observe. The man who 
transgresses them loses his credit, the 
respect of business men; loses his job 
and is unable to get another. You can 
not trangress on business rules. 

The way of the transgressor is hard 
on his family. Notice that man with 
the red nose. I want you to call at his 
home with me. There is next to no 
furniture. The wreck of what was 
once a handsome woman, clad in rags. 
The children are barefoot. The boys 
are following their father's example. 
They are betting, and swearing, and 
lying, and often — from ten years up — 
stealing and fighting. No one comes 
to see this family — they are socially os- 
tracised. Do you see? If a man is 
mean his family suffers. They suffer 
his cruelties, the influence of his asso- 
ciation on their lives, and bear with 
him his unenviable reputation. 

Then nothing is truer than that the 
way of the transgressor is hard on his 
mind. Think of the man out of work, 
out of credit, out of money, out of books 
and out of health. Alchohol and to- 
bacco prey on the brain. All manner 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



of excess harms the brain. If you 
weaken yonr body you rob your brain 
of some of its support. The finest 
tenses are dulled by yonr coarse asso- 
ciates. One bad habit is always a step 
down to another still worse, until you 
have reached immorality and murder. 

The way of the transgressor is hard 
because it is against law — a walking 
over. All of our police and United 
States marshals are to make the way 
of the transgressor of the law hard. If 
you don't think the way of the trans- 
gressor is hard get the bar docket for 
the next term of court. Look over the 
court records and the jail records. 
Peep into the penitentiaries and insane 
asylums. Visit the gallows. Go with 
the mob. Read in the daily papers of 
battles with outlaws. Hard way: hard 
service; hard master; hard pay. 

Hard on society. "One sinner de- 
stroyeth much good."' Oh, what an 
uproar in society caused by murder and 
drink and impurity. How the society of 
a place is -loathed by strangers for the 
reputation of many of its members. 
"The wicked shall pass away." "Lo 3 1 
sought him and he could not be found.'" 

The way of the transgressor may be 
a hard way, but it will also be a thorny 
way. The briar of conscience will 
continually wound him, and memory 
and fear ever harass him. The trans-" 
gressor's way is usually past the saloon. 
the police, the jail, the judge, the pen- 
itentiary, the grave and hell. He may 
escape the judge, the jail and the po- 
lice, and in a few cases, the saloon. 
The way of most transgressors docs not 
lead past the penitentiary, but none 
shall escape the grave: and "except ye 
repent." none will escape hell. "Ye 
shall all likewise perish.*" "If ye sow 



to the flesh, ye shall of the flesh reap 
corruption." "Whatsoever a ma; 
eth that shall he also reap." The tares 
grow with the wheat, but shall be gath- 
ered out from the (wheat by and by. 
God shall soon sit to equalize the affairs 
of men. then will the transgressor learn 
that in this life "... ceiv 1 his good 
pleasure, his good time, and that the 
the wages of sin is death. 

AS APPLIED TO NATIONS. 

"The way of the transg] ■ r is 
hard." David wrote it "He 

(God) hath not dealt so with ai:_. 
tion." This is true, but it is also true 
that no other nation dealt so with God. 
There is always some good in a na 
and so in an individual. The ti- 
ls we encourage the g It little and 
the bad too much; hence an o 
ponderanee of the bad. Israel. 
the world at large, came to think that 
all things would go on about the same 
as they had bean going from the begin- 
ning. As a result the; into 
drunkenness, idol worship^ fornication. - 
lasciviousness. and every conceivable 
form of vice. For disobedience — walk- 
ing over- the command of God came 
the first sorrow. Man. was excommuni- 
cated. The happy Eden should not be ' 
his in so vile a state Children were 
given, one of whom slew another. Then 
came the mark of God*- lispl .sure, 
followed by repentance, which caused 
God to protect the fugitn e. Soon 
again do we begin to see this downhill 
bias of humanity appearing. Then be- 
cause the imaginations of man's : 
was evil, and only evil, and that con- 
tinually, came the- flood. A few per- 
sons are spared, and as soon as the dan- 
ger seems- over, humanity again shows 
its bias. 



THE DROUGHT, 



God ehose to specially deal with Is- 
rael, and God's dealings with 
this people is the basis of God's 
dealings with all nations. Israel for- 
sakes God and goes to Egypt as slaves. 
They repent, cease to worship idols, 
and return to the living God. Moses 
is sent as a deliverer. Pharaoh refuses 
to let God's people go, and the hand of 
Providence is laid heavily on the coun- 
try: (1) The waters of the Nile became 
blood: (2) then came the frogs: (3) then 
the lice or mosquitoes: (4) the flies or 
beetles: (5) the murrain in the cattle; 
(6) the blains or boils: (7) hail and thun- 
der: (8) locusts: (9) darkness: (10) first 
born of al! killed in a single night. 
Then they repented and let God's peo- 
ple go. The people started, and then 
they see what a loss of money and labor 
they will sustain, so they try to follow 
and recapture them, but God over- 
throws them in the sea. 

Again Israel forsook God and were 
bitten by serpents. 

I only follow this people because the 
Book says plainly they were an exam- 
ple unto us. 

They were carried to Babylon be- 
cause they sinned against God. They 
who obeyed were exalted in the heath- 
en land, as is evidenced by the biog- 
raphies of Shadrach, Meschach, Daniel, 
Abednogo, Esther and Mordecai. What 
caused alhthis trouble? Sin. Why is 
Jerusalem a barren waste? Sin did it. 
The nations that wander away and 
forget God shall be turned into hell. 
Again, "The wicked shall be turned to 
destruction. 

Look at France —a nation of infidels. 
What is its history? A series of wars, 
seditions, murders, and assassinations. 
They are always seeking pleasure, and 



always getting into trouble 
your geography a little and see b 
her territory has d iminished. Its God's 
doings and marvellous w lo yes. 

Three or four years ago what 
pened in Russia, a Godl< 
Millions starving. Ami rici 
See Ireland in the sam p ig In- 

stance the China-Japan war. S ,; srhat 
heathenism with its multiplied mil- 
lions fails to do against semi-Christ] 
civilization. And why ?' } 

"They forsook God which made th 
and lightly esteemed the R >ckof I I 
salvation." They we] e pi md 

became trken of theii pi isperil 
"Jeshurnn waxed fa1 md ki k ; " 

In Paris there are one t m Iv ' d 
eighteen illegitimat to i ) 1 idred 
legitimate children; sixty fivi 
hundred in New York. Yon 
cern the face of the sky Cai yon i 
anything of the signs of the times? 
War, earthquake, famine, droutt d 

uses the mildest means ] ?ssibl 1 it 
his mighty arm hall ge\ ] ' the 

victory. We shall ackn dge him 

Lord of all. 

"The drought general . Tl 
world has been having a 'dry time' for 
at least two years. There has not been 
an absolute locking up of the heavens 
all over the universe for that period, 
but there have been grea 1 ir; 
Russia and in the fertile United States, 
and the great rivers of this continent, 
have been singularly and continuously 
low. The Mississippi has been rej 
ed at its lowest point in a record of six- 
ty years. In Texas the dry spell was 
considered to have lasted two years. 
The weather bureau at Lawrence, 
Kan., reported the April just elos< 
the dryest April in twenty-seven years, 
and the four months of 1895 as the dry-. 
est four continuous months in more 
than a quarter of a century. " • Kansas 
City Star. 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



The whole country drought stricken! ye children of men. " "But if ye will 
What is the mattery You are to blame uot do this be sure your sins will find 
for it. When there are no righteous, you out." "The way of the transgress- 
or next to none, God does not cause it or is hard." 

lo rain on us all alike. Talk to me of Oh, return unto the Lord and he will 

meteorological law! You can hollow have mercy upon you and abundantly 

yourself hoarse. God is back of it all. pardon. 

Providence is chastening the sons be- Oh. that men would praise the Lord 

.ore receiving them. You are turned for his goodness, and for his wonderful 

. n. „ T1 T works to the children of men. 
everyone to his own way. The Lorn 

Repent ve cruel sons of men, 
nas been •■a\\.Iig: ' "Realm unto me. Oh That God may send you plenteous rain 

"The harvest of the earth is fully ripe: 

Vengeance begins to tread the great wine-press 

Of fierceness and of wrath, and Mercy pleads. 

Mercy that pleaded long — she pleads no more. 

Whence comes that darkness? Whence those yells of woe? 

What thunderings are these that shake the world? 

Why fall the lamps from heaven as blasted figs? 

Why tremble righteous men?- Why angels pale? 

Why is all fear? What has become of hope? 

God comes! God. in his car of vengeance comes! 

Hark! Louder on the blast come hollow shrieks 

Of dissolution! In the fitful scowl 

Of night, near and more near, angels of death 

lucessautly flap their wings, and roar 

Through all the fevered air: the mountains rock; 

The moon is siek. and all the stars of heaven 

Burn feebly. Oft and sudden gleams the fire 

Revealing awfully the brow of wrath. 

The thunder, long and loud, utters his voice. 

Responsive to the ocean's troubled growl. 

Night comes: Last night, the long, dark, dark, da; k bight 

That has no morn beyond it. and no star. 

Xo eye of man hath seen a night like this! 

Heaven's trampled justice girds itself for fight! 

Earth, to thy knees, and cry for mercy! Cry 

With earnest heart, for thou art growing old 

And hoary, unrepented. unforgiven. 

And all thy glory mourns: thy vintage mourns. 

Bashan and Carmel, mourn, and weep, and mourn! 

Thou, Lebanon, with all thy cedars mourn! 

"Except repentance overtake us. swift destruction will: 
Repentance alone, can outrun wrath." 

—Pollock's "Course of Time: Last day of earth at hand." pp22t>-22T. 



Signs of tfie ?imgs, 



CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM. 



Lesson, Genesis 13. 
Text, Gen. 4:9, "Am I my brother's 
keeper?" 

EXORDIUM. 

From the beginning of the human 
family this has been one of the "ques- 
tions of the day." 

I do not care to follow the old plan of 
proof as to who is my brother, but I de- 
sire to assert the "Fatherhood of God," 
the "Sonship of Man," and the ''Broth- 
erhood of Humanity." 

I apprehend that there are some per- 
sons who will question my right to dis- 
cuss social questions, but some people 
would so circumscribe the pulpit as to 
legislate it out of existence. The true 
grounds of sociological peace is found 
in the utterance of the patriarch, 
Abraham: "And Abram said" unto Lot 
Let there be no strife, I pray thee, be- 
tween me and thee, and between my 
herdmen and thy herdmen; for we are 
brethren." 

Most people think religion a mere 
matter of speculation, but it is the most 
practical thing in the world. Then, 
there is a certain percentage in modern 
society entirely indifferent to progress. 
They seek their own wherever they can 
find it, with very little consideration 
of the bearing of their actions on the 
well-being of the community. This 
sheer selfishness is the cause of nine- 
tenths of the world's evils. 



Socialism attempts to solve the prob- 
lem of suffering without eliminating 
the factor of sin. It says: "From each 
according to his abilities; to each ac- 
cording to his wants. ' ' But this dictum 
of Louis Blanc could be realized only in 
a perfect society. Forgetting that 
there is no political alchemy by which 
you can get golden conduct from leaden 
instinct, socialism thinks to regenerate 
society without first regenerating the 
individual. It proposes to work this 
regeneration by re-organizing society 
on a co-operative instead of a competi- 
tive basis. It talks much of fraternity, 
but forgets what Maurice finally said: 
''.There is no fraternity without a com- 
mon father" — Our Country. 

The family used to be the unit of gov- 
ernment. The church is the family of 
God — the household of faith. "One is 
your Master, even Cnrist; and all ye 
are-brethren."— [Matt. 23:8.] 

This principle must be recognized by 
Christians and reformers, and accepted 
by the universal family of men before 
anything like a sociological paradise 
shall come to pass. 

1. Socialism is that doctrine of soci- 
ology which teaches the reconstruction 
of society by modifying or destroying 
the present economic basis. 

CHRISTIAN SOCIOLOGY 

presents an ideal brotherhood to be re- 
alized as the next and highest growth 

75 



76 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



in the evolution of society. The type 
of socialism underlying- the Greek 
states, which subordinates individual 
interests to its sovereignty, is worked 
out in Plato's "Republic," and re-ap- 
pears in every socialistic scheme. 
Whatever its type and wherever round 
its deepest significance lies in its being 
a reaction of the common people 

.. ast repressive conditions, and their 
rise into the consciousness that they 
are persons socially entitled to recog- 
nition; attracted by new hopes, spurred 
by high* i de Ires, reaching into better 
conditions. 

The burden of elevating society is 
thrown upon the church. Organized 
industry cannot do it. Organized soci- 
ety as ate has no power to trans- 
form lives. Law represses evil, but if 
it attempts to extinguish it, sits upon 
afety valve. In time the church 
•oused to action, and what it has 
done, or proposes to do with social prob- 
lems, is called Christian Socialism. 

Kingsley defines it as "Christianity 
applied to social relations." 

Christian Socialism in the United 
Stales has indirectly secured legislation 
sufficient to cove] many social wrongs, 
and today affirms that society is better 
than twenty years ago. The fact that 
hundreds of offenses are punishable to- 
day that were not regarded as crimes 
fifty years ago, shows a comparative re- 
duction in the number of crimes and 
the awakening of public conscience and 
an elevating of social standards. 

REGENERATION NECESSARY. 

2. A new set of conditions cannot 
succeed unless accompanied by a new 
heart." — [Barton.] We insist upon re- 
generation of the individual as essential 
to social reformation. It fights in Val- 



halla warfare — its enemies are in the 
fiesh. Therefore it demands of its 
members the personal and voluntary 
destruction of sin in themselves, and 
personal p i to social evils. 

which are embodied in individual so- 
cial units. It realizes liberty, equality 
and fraternity in their true meaning 
and correct proportions. For near 
nineteen hundred years it has elevated 
man defended the weak: secured rights 
and 1] I ' the cost of its own con- 

secrated blood: has opposed the law of 
selfishness which always drives 
weakest to the wall, and has energized 
a faculty in the socially unfit so that 
they have survived. As a society uni- 
versal it presents a basis for' tl high- 
est and most composite social unity. It 
is the only logical socialism, in that it 
aims to eradicate the causes which un- 
derlie our social evils. "The rich 
be increasing their wealth, bui tain- 
ly the poor are improving th 
tion, for there is proportionately less 
immorality among the poor than among, 
the wealty.*' — Dr. Hegerman. 

If I am a member of the great h 
family, and my brethren live from the 
ice fields to the orange groves — are both 
barbarous and scientific — am I in any 
sense their keeper? If so. in what way 
and to what degree. 

THE BROTHERHOOD. 

Christian Socialism aims to realize 
the ideal Brotherhood in Christ by in- 
carnating the Holy Ghost in personal 
life, and through the co-operation of its 
members bring all things to the will of 
our common Father. As the body of 
Christ, the church is visible. Its E 
is the Carpenter of Xazareth. His 
teaching in the parable of the net. and 
of the tears, shows that the kingdom is 



CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM. 



77 



a : visible organization in the world, and 
his socialistic utterances made him the 
Outcast of the rich and of the mighty. 
His kingdom started as a social and hu- 
manitarian society, aiming to realize 
divine manhood, and has secured the 
only true social democracy which is to- 
day growing and shall develop into the 
new Jerusalem; into which the kings of 
the earth shall bring their glory, and 
which shall be the consumation of a 
new heaven and a new earth, wherein 
dwelleth righteousness. The standard 
of the Judgment day. as set up by the 
King himself, is the performance of so- 
cial duties as unto him. 

Christian Socialism submits its prin- 
ciples as affording the only true basis 
for a transformed social order, which is 
realized only in the church, though 
there imperfectly. 

Its Form of Conduct.- -Love of 
neighbor as of self tends to harmonize 
inequality by the proportionate union 
and balance of altruism and egoism. It 
produces the highest type of manhood, 
secures natural rights to all, and takes 
away the hindrances to equal natural 
opportunity to all. 

Its Law of Division of Responsi- 
bility. — ''Every man shall bear his 
own burden," teaching that no one can 
escape doing his share. "Bear one an- 
other's burdens, and so fulfill the law of 
Christ,'' places co-operation for the gen- 
erel good on the higest moral ground, 
and teaches the duty of the all-of-us to 
the overburdened-of-us. ■■» ■ 

"The strong shall bear the iufirmities 
of the weak:" "unto whom much is 
given, of them much shall be required/'' 
contain the law of socialism; "from 
each according to his ability, to each 
according to his need;" or, burdens are 



apportioned according to ability, and 
privilege determines the degree of re- 
sponsibility. It reminds one of Spencer's 
law of society: during a certain period 
each must receive benefits in proportion 
to his incapacity: after- that in propor- 
tion to his capacity. The parable of the 
pounds teaches the inequality of en- 
dowments; responsibility proportionate 
to the gift or trust, and equality of re- 
ward for faithful service. 

Law of Labor.— "If a man will 
not work, neither shall he eat," throws 
a strong light upon many phases of pau- 
perism, and calls in the operation of the 
natural law of social extinction upon 
those who would claim rights and priv- 
ileges without bearing their share of 
work and doing their duty. The Christ- 
taught prayer for daily bread shows 
that there has been provision made for 
every human need. If a man be will- 
ing to work there should be opportuni- 
ty. This is one of Henry George's car- 
dinal points in his answer to Pope Leo's 
encyclical. "Give ye to them to eat," 
teach the duty to care for those whom 
circumstances have prevented from 
gaining food. 

Law of Social Order.— "Thy king- 
dom come, Thy will be done in earth as 
it is in heaven," teaches the existence 
of the kingdom of heaven in this world, 
and realizing its essential heavenly con- 
ditions in proportion to the obedience 
to the King's will by its members. 

"Thy will be done," means, on the 
part of every one who prays, obedience 
to natural! law in social and personal 
realms. Hence, legislation must not in- 
■terfer'e' >wfth< Go'd*S will; it should not 
Scatter the ; fire of moral Gehennas 
which are consuming moral refuse in 
Centres of evil'; it must not injure per- 
sonality. 



7^ 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 



Law of Social Values.— Person- 
ality is the most precious thing in the 
world. Its harm or lose injures society. 
Whatever degrades it most is the great- 
est social evil. Its elevation is the se- 
curity and glory of society. Correlat- 
edprineiples teach that the individual 
is superior to circumstances, and that 
character determines condition. Loss 
of personal force caused by licentious- 
ness and intemperance is the chief 
source of pauperism. Animalism is a 
cause and accelerating force of these 
habits. 

Ideal brotherhood can only obtain 
through Christ. Xo man cometh unto 
the Father but by me. 

THE CHURCH, 

4. So much force, so much result. 
So much coal, so many pounds of steam. 
This is true in religion as everywhere. 

bo you wonder why it is so hard to 
elevate the masses'? We have 
put the meal in the bowl and the leaven 
in the oven. By our graded pew 
rentals, etc.. we have excluded the 
masses from the social leaven of the 
gospel, and yet we say don't seek bet- 
ter circumstances but a character that 
will create conditions. We have been 
satisfied with lighting foes in the air, 
but are slow to meet the enemies of the 
brotherhood — ignorance, improper food 
intemperance, unhealthful and unholy 
surroundings. inequality, helplessness 
and despair. Yes! I am my broth- 
er's keeper; for I help to make the 
atmosphere in which he lives and 
thrives, or the odorous gas that stran- 
gles him to death. 

We do much to fit men for the next 
world, but forget that they are not yet 
disembodied spirits. 

The world needs sympathy, not 
money. 



The church should present to the 
world a volume of its evidences as the 
true Christian socialism, taken out of 
the real life nf today, challenging in- 
vestigation and tests. 

More stress should be laid on the im- 
portance of environment in saving souls. 
Experience teaches that converts fall 
back unless they can get away from 
their old surroundings. Putting the 
devil in heaven would not make an an- 
gel of him. 

Expecting human nature to become 
saintly in the midst of hellish condi- 
tions is to. attribute to weak characters 
the strength of mature Christians. The 
enemies of man are always embodied. 

Each Christian should impress a 
living Christ upon those who are provi- 
dentially in touch with him. Society 
has natural adjustments which are bet- 
ter adapted for Christain work than 
artificial arrangements. We can best 
impress Christ upon those with whom 
we are in the natural bond of relation- 
ship, such as the members of the home, 
masters and servants, business men and 
employes, comrades, friends and social 
members. This demands the Christ in- 
carnate in personal life. One whose 
life is not Christlike can do no good by 
talking religion to those who know 
Him. 

There should be a parish system 
with federated authority to distribute 
means and workers where the need is 
greatest and to intelligently direct their 
work. 

We should not be satisfied with con- 
tact through natural points of sympathy 
but should direct our lives to come into 
touchVith the outcasts of society. So- 
cial problems will be solved when the 
leaven is properly mixed in the masses. 



CHRISTIAN SOCIALISM. 



79' 



The leavened members go into society, 
churches, and select neighborhoods, 
and the meal is left to itself. By sym- 
pathetic or loving- contact, sentiments 
will rise among- the masses, faculties 
will be educated, principles awaken, 
a regenerated life arise from the dead, 
and the people themselves by their 
own energy and character will solve 
many of our social problems. 

DENOMINATION A LISM. 

5. Denominational rivalry and the 
struggle for existence makes a church 
a weakling where it should be a giant 
Great Heart. This demands co-opera- 



tion of denominations,- reduction of fric- 
tion, economy of means' and workers.- 
Strong Christians should live in dis- 
tricts where they can accomplish the 
greatest good,' and can awaken a public 
sentiment and demand for better public 
service, cleaner momes and purer lives. 
This should be in love to the people, 
not for any church, not for the exercise' 
of spiritual graces as a means of self- 
development. 

Christianity through Christ, and in- 
no other way, is the cure of all evils.' 
and the true spring of all reform. 



Sips of ffig tRines. 



LOYALTY TO CHRIST, TESTS OF. 



"The fining- pot is for silver, and the 
furnace for gold, but the Lord trieth 
the hearts."— Prov. 17:3. 

"Every man's work shall be made 
manifest: for the day shall declare it, 
because it shall be revealed by fire: 
and the fire shall try every man's work 
of what sort it is."— 1st. Cor. 3:13. 

EXORDIUM. 

Were this paper read to a band of 
heathen, the first question would, be: 
"Who is Christ?" and the next: "What 
is Loyalty?'" Questions that will hard- 
ly be asked here; but there is a ques- 
tion that may be raised in your minds, 
which will arise from an insufficient 
answer of the first question: "Under 
what obligations am I to Christ that I 
should be loyal to him?'' Your answer 
to this question will depend on your 
conception of his nature and office, and 
that will mark the degree of your fidel- 
ity. 

I am now addressing an assembly 
who have sworn allegiance to Christ as 
King. Your oath of allegiance is not 
all, however, that is demanded of you 
beneath the banner of the cross, any 
more than it is all asked of one from 
our national ensign — you must pay tax- 
es and work the roads. 

"Sure I must fight if I would reign." 



Note. — This paper was originally read before 
the Kast Congregational Association, at Perkins 
O. T., October 3, 1S94, 

So 



' ; So faith without works is dead," and 
our works are to be tried by fire. 

Let us now turn our eyes to history's 
page, and to the Sacred Book, and 
learn if possible, what will be expected 
of us and prepare for the test. 
Abraham. 

We of to-day. think of this patriarch 
as the essence of fidility. You think 
of the lifted knife, over the son of his 
hope: the journey into a country that 
he knew not of, and the dividing of pas- 
ture with Lot. as one who. Enoch-like, 
walked with God, while by our acts we 
confess ourselves unable, not . to sacri- 
fice a son on the alter of our loyalty. 
but not even so much as our poorest 
joys. 

Noah. 

For 120 years we see Noah toiling — 
toiling against popular opinion, the 
amusments and vices of the time, and 
working with his hands to make an ark 
[Salvation] for the salvation of such as 
would heed the warning voice of God. 
The ark is now finished, but Noah's 
test is not ended. God orders him to 
enter. The boat is upon dry ground. 
The sun shines in the crystal heav- 
ens. Not a cloud: but Noah enters into 
no argument with God. No lingering. 
but willing and prompt obedience. 

This anticipates my idea of loyalty. 
for the present time. When God had 
thus tested him by adversity, which he 



LOYALTY TO CHRIST, TESTS OF. 



81 



so admirably endured he was placed in 
the garden of prosperity, where the 
vine yielded juice, and he fell by the 
power of his own passion and became 
unfaithful. 

My brethern! Let us learn a lesson. 
Few men can stand prosperity. Re- 
member, "the love of of the world and 
the deceitfulness of riches" steal many 
souls from their allegiance to Christ. 

OTHER FAITHFUL ONES. 

The time would fail me to tell the 
history of Gideon and his faithful few; 
Of David, who watched the lambs, who 
slew the Philistine and ruled a king- 
dom; of Daniel in the den of lions; 
Shadrach. Meschach and Abednego in 
the firey furnace; of the ones persecu- 
ted by bonds, burned to stakes, 
sawn asunder, etc. But every man's 
work is tried of what sort it is, and I 
want you to try your own life by God's 
word. 

Real steadfastness, godly fidelity, like 
good works, imply and pre-suppose be- 
lief and trust in God. Even among men 
a trusty person is a trustful person. 
One who has no faith in God, or in his 
•fellowmen is a person that we are wise 
neither to hire nor- confide in. 

Faithfulness — loyalty — and faith 
when carried to their ultimate, imply 
each other; but there must be a test to 
prove the 'former that the latter may 
be also observed. To stand firm to 
principle amid . reproach, steadily to 
separate abiding -truth from its tempo- 
rary counterfeits, to resist ridicule and 
the strength of language — so often sub- 
stituted for strength of argument — to 
.throw on one side accusations of nar- 
rowness and ignorance, irritating as 
they, are to a just self-respect; to rise 
superior to periodic fluctuations of opin- 



ion as ceaseless as the ebb and flow of 
the tide, and amid these various influ- 
ences to maintain with singleness of 
heart and accuracy of eye, the truth of 
God, is the most difficult of all conflicts 
and the most glorious of victories. 
Brethren, we are in such a warfare, 
besieged by such enmity. Shall our 
banner be found trailing in the dust, or 
when the din of the battle ceases, shall 
our voices make resonant the air with 
"All hail the power of Jesus' name!" 

Men become reprobate by degrees; it 
is in little things that we become un- 
faithful. 

SIZE MADE A SYNONYM FOR SERVICE. 

There is no security save in with- 
standing beginnings. We should be on 
our guard against depreciating the im- 
portance of conscientiousness in minor 
affairs, for by the commission of little 
wrongs we may break through the en- 
amel of our conscience and the nerve 
itself become dead, at which time we 
can act with impunity like a wild en- 
gine, much steam, no safety valve and 
no one at the throttle. 

It is the little things that make up 
life. The little acts of kindness or of 
enmity that any child might show. 
Remember it is he who is faithful 
over a few things that is to be ruler 
over many things. 

LOT. 

What a difference there is in Lot as 
you see him offering sacrifice to God 
with Abraham at the altar of Bethel. 
and as he was on that day when hurried 
by the angels hand from burning Sod- 
om. He was saved, "yet so as by fire.' - 
Do you know how all this came about? 
I think the secret of it is found in a 
question asked by Lot at the very hour 
of his delivery. He said to the angel, 



82 



SIGNS OPTliE TIMES'. 



with reference to Zoar: "Is it not a 
little one?'- God's command was not to 
stop la all the plain, of the cities there- 
of. 

We say of so many things, "Is it not 
a little one?*' But God says. "Abstain 
from the very appearance of evil." 
Brethren, let us discriminate License' 
and Loyalty. 

This was probably not the first time 
Lot had used like words. It had be- 
come habitual with him as it has with 
us. 

I think we are usually loyal IN cur 
preaching— loyal to our convictions of 
what we think the Book means— but 
we are seldom loyal TO our preaching. 
Our lives and sermons do not corre- 
spond. Look at Lot in the division of 
the pasture —well watered valley, nice 
for sheep and cattle, etc. "But Sodom 
is in it," said Conscience. ''Isn't that 
a little thing?" replies Lot. ''I need 
not go into the city unless I want to.'* 
So he pitched his tent toward Sodom. 

When once there it was another 
"little thing" to go into the city, and 
another to become a citizen, and anoth- 
er for his daughter to marry with its 
inhabitants; and this is his reward: 
Deprived of his flocks and herds, of his 
wife and children, save two daugeters. 
and his deliverence not the result of 
his loyalty, but of Abraham's interces- 
sion. 

It is a little thing to step into a sa- 
loon. When in. it is a little thing to 
take a glass. But by a multiplicity of 
these little things, we have the heinous 
aggregate — drunkenness. 

It is a seeming little thing to speak a 
word against a fellow man but we 
should remember. Matthew 13:33, "By 
thv words:" and- Will Carlton's 



"Sbys flying kites" pall in their' white winged 3 

birds; 
But we can't do that way when we are flying 

words.,' 

It seems a ill; iie thing to be jocular 
and I and as though lies.- on this score 
as any of us. But we should all read 
Ephesians 5:4. ""neither filthiness nor 

foolishness." 

Then it is a "'little thing" to take 
Sunday visits and buggy rides: but God 
Ivas admonished u to keep his day holy,, 
and do you remember what Jesus has 
said in this' connection: "If ye love 
me; keep my comma ndmeuts.' 

It is a little thing to frequent the 
places of popular amusements, and Vet 
the Book says: "Is any merry? Let 
him sing psalms." Then there . 

fs another point we forget. Sec Colos- 
sians 3:17. "Do ale to the glory of 
God." Xot a negative, but a positive 
element is loyalty to Christ. 

There are many who do but few 
things prohibited by the gospels— in 
fact they seldom do anything. We are 
known and read of all men. Our piety 
and purity is the constant talk of the 
public, or our lack of the same. There 
is no compromise with- loyalty. Xot' by 
what we do and say in public, or on the 
Sabbath of the Lord's Supper is Jeho- 
vah testing:.- 

He is reading us as we reveal our- 
selves in the m-inute details of our daily 
business and domestic life and by such 
things as the giving of a cup of cold 
water, or the refusal' of the same. 

"Man looketh on the outward part:" 
God loofceth on the heart.-* ft does not 
follow that the person who prates loud- 
est of his virtues and his graces is of 
a truth most true to his trust. For 
fiothingf is ftru«¥ than, if a fturta is no: 



LOYALTY TO CHRIST, TESTS OF. 



83 



faithful in that which is least, neither 
will he be in that which is much. 

"By a thousand household cares, 

By beauty everywhere; 
By much and easy gain; 

Promised pleasure for our pain; 
Are we tempted each to stray 

From the right and loyal way each day." 

OUR TESTS. 

It is the test of the store, the yard- 
stick and balance: the test of the office, 
with impetuous clients; the test of the 
school room with unruly pupils; the 
farm with breechy cattle. Our mettle 
is tested by friction with the world and 
our endurance by criticism. Not a 
burning-, fiery furnace is ours, but of 
rum and poisoned tongues. 



PERORATION. 

Loyalty radiates all our days with 
lofty beauty, and it makes them all 
hallowed and divine, when wo feel that 
not the apparent greatness, not the 
prominence or noise with which it is 
done, nor the external consequences 
which flow from it, but the motive from 
which it flowed, determines its value in 
the eyes of God. 

Faithfulness is faithfulness on what- 
soever scale measured. 

Then what is the use of repining? 

For where there's a will there's a way. 
Tomorrow the sun may be shining, 

Although it is cloudy today. 

For we walk by faith, and not by 
sight. 



2h& IrgagBer in folitie: 



. D When the righteous ■ are in author- 
ity, the people rejoice: but when the 
wicked beareth rule. the people 
mourn. — Pro v. xxix 2. 

It is a time-honored custom to con- 
sult the preacher about. Morals, 
domestic and social Ethics. Business 
investments, and all manner of Science. 
He is expected to be authority on how 
to raise calves, grow cabbage, keep 
sweet on wash day — in fact on anything 
but politics. 

Politics are held to be foreign to his 
calling, vile and contaminating and 
hence: beyond his sphere. Many 
preachers in these "last days" are as- 
serting that they have not only the 
right but a solemn and sacred duty 
in the fields of political economy. 

The first essential in order to a proper 
solution of this subject is an accurate 
definition of each term employed. 

Webster has defined politics as 
"The science of government; that part 
of ethics which has to do with the reg- 
ulation of a state or nation, the preser- 
vation of its safety, peaco and 
prosperity, the defense of its existence 
and rights against foreign control or 
conquest, the augmentation of its 
strength and resources, and the pro- 
tection of the citizens in their rights, 

with the PRESERVATION AND IMPROVE- 
MENT OF THEIR MORALS." 

We must discriminate politics and 
partizenship. 

A partisan may. or may not be a 
politician, cither in the true sense of 



the word or in its frequent application. 

A partisan is an "adherent to a par- 
ty or faction: especially, having the 
character of blind. passionate or unrea- 
sonable adherence to a party: as 
blinded by partisan zeal." — Webster. 

It is certain that no preacher has a 
right to become a partisan. He has 
no right to become "blind, passionate 
or unreasonable,", for the true preach- 
er is not a representative of a mere 
party, faction, clan or sect. 
. He is not merely an attorney for a 
certain congregation. He is not a 
mouthpiece for some influential broth- 
er in the church. He is not the voice 
of the majority of the membership— or 
better their echo. 

He is not the tail end of the intel- 
lectual procession and the fag. end of- 
progress. 

He is not an old fogy or any other 
kind of fogy. 

He is not a mere ecclesiastic. He is 
no out-of-date, back-number theorist. ' 
but he is a man. every inch of him. and 
a leader. 

He is not an elocutionist or a dram- 
atist, but a worker, a thinker and a 
teacher. 

He is the voice of one crying in the 
wilderness of crookedness. "Prepare 
ye the way of the Lord: make his 
paths straight." 

Yes, he is the advance - : civ- 

ilization: the scout of progress. 

Is not the preacher conceded to be a 
teacher of morals? Has not he the 



THE PREACHER IN POLITICS. 



85 



rights of the people at heart? 

If politics has to do with not only the 
preservation but the improvement of 
morals, — and so Webster states, — then 
politics are akin to Christianity, and 
so far as political conditions influence 
mental and moral conditions, the 
preacher, if true to his office work, 
must enter the arena, as an exponent 
of righteousness. 

1. "When the righteous rule the 
•people rejoice." 

Is it of no consequence whether 
Samuel or the filthy sons of Eli rule Is- 
rael? Whether Saul or David be 
king? 

Is it of no consequence to each be- 
neath his reign, whether Cambyses 
shall gather the "choice sons" of Me- 
do— Persia and lead them to death in 
the desert, or whether Darius shall 
sway the gentle sceptre of Peace? 

Could it be of no interest to a teach- 
er of the loving gospel of the tender 
Son of God, whether the constitution, 
edicts and laws of a Draco, which were 
said to be written in blood, or whether 
the affairs of the people were in the 
hands of a Solon, who would repeal 
harsh measures, relieve those in debt, 
buy the freedom of the slave, stop the 
sale of innocent childhood, compel the 
parents to educate the children and 
the children to" care for the enfeebled 
parents? 

Is it all the same to every lover of 
life, of truth, of beauty and of virtue; 
is it all the same, according to the 
definition of ' politics, whether Herod 
shall slay the infants of the land, 
Nero murder his wife and revel in 
song while' the flames lick up ihe man- 
sions of the* capitol, or such a charcter 
as Joseph, who stored the corn in 
Egypt for the famine, or Constantine, 
who bore the cross as. an ensign of the 



triumph of Righteousness? 

"When the righteous beareth 
rule"— ah, there is rejoicing! 

Do you like to see happy people? Do 
you enjoy songs of praise more than 
exultation? Would you see this a 
happy land — a prosperous land — a land 
blessed of heaven? Then the right- 
eous must rule the nation. 

Brother Preacher, if you want a 
happy people, in a happy country, you 
must take your true position as a lead- 
er of your congregation and preach 
righteousness. "Righteousness exalt- 
eth a nation, but sin is a reproach to 
any people," and is most certainly a 
reproach to the giver of all good. 

I don't say you should preach pop- 
ulism, republicanism or democracy, 
but I do say you should preach Hones- 
ty, Purity and Ability. 

You should preach right relations 
one to another and to God. 

The preacher should enter politics 
as the representative of God Al- 
mighty. The other fellow — that is, 
the wicked are in the field for suprem- 
acy. 

They are in the field with money, 
with drinks and smokes and stump- 
speakers. They are as full of decep- 
tion as a swamp is full of malaria, and 
what is still Worse, the newspapers are 
subsidized until they become vehicles 
of sophistry and slander. 

Please keep the text in view, it is 
politics, not party, that the preacher 
must deal with. I had rather be a 
"man without a party" than to have a 
corrupt one on hands. 

Remember that partisanship is blind- 
ness, hence selfishness, wickedness, 
devilishness. 

Change the ensign of : the honest 
sons of toil, "Corn is King," to "Rum 
is King," and what have you done? 



86 



THE PREACHER IN POLITICS. 



You have stopped many useful branch- 
es of industrry; changed the songs of 
the children into cries for bread; 
pushed a casket into thousands upon 
thousands of homes: hung- crape over a 
million doors; broken the hearts of a 
million mothers, of a half a million 
wives and three million children; — 
when the wicked beareth rule! 

Is this all? No! No! See the de- 
pleted treasuries, the lost virtue, the 
blighted manhood, the orphan chil- 
dren! 

Is this all? Nay : a million woes are 
to follow. 

If political affairs are given over 
into the hands of the wicked, well may 
we expect that this fair maid — Colum- 
bia—will be soiled by their ruthless 
touch. 

Our whole campaign system needs 
flavoring with the Golden Rule. 

A man said to me, "It cost me $25.00 
to carry that precinct." 
I asked "how did you do it?" 

"Well you see they are all , 

(foreigners) I went up and seen Old 

, and he promised to do all he 

could for me. He is a good . 

(party given.) I gave him $25.00 to 
spend in the saloon." 

"I will get that solid," and he did. 
If men use money to get office, woe 
be unto the people. The money must 
be made back some way — when the 
wicked beareth rule. 

What is the history of our own 
nation? 

We hear everywhere the low dull 
murmur of complaint, like the rum- 
bling that precedes an earthquake, or 
the roll of thunder before a summer 
shower. The head of the laborer is 
bowed low, and his children are grow- 
ing up ragged and unlearned, while 
the gnawing of hunger is driving 



many of them to theft and disgrace. 

This, however, has no distant cause 
or profound secret. "When the wick- 
ed beareth ruie the people mourn." 

The saloon has been in politics and 
has used every art of snbtility to elect 
its representatives, and from the rank 
of its customers has come street com- 
missioners, city councilmen, legis- 
lators, congressmen, governors, 
judges, jurors, sheriffs and police. 
Hand-in- hand with commandery has 
marched the whole regiment of gam- 
blers, the entire company of bawdy 
houses, the detachment of prize fight- 
ers, and the whole swarm of the 
sporting circle have joined them, . to 
secure either offensive or defensive 
measures. 

. The result is bad law. badly admin- 
istered, by bad men. 

However, these are not all of the 
elements that are entering into our po- 
litical life, and you know "'whatsoever a 
man soweth, that shall he also reap" 
in kind, but thirty, sixty, or a hundred 
fold in quantity. 

But allow me to say that virtue is a 
late plant, while the weeds of vice 
grow early. 

The scripture that commands us to 
submit to the ordinances of men for 
God's sake, does not command us to 
forget that we are men and. have 
something to do with forming these 
ordinances. 

The Mormons have entered the field 
hoping to be balance of power and se- 
cure favorable legislation. Beyond a 
doubt where they have a considerable 
strength, Catholics do the same thing. 
There should be no such thing in 
America as the ''Irish vote." the 
•'Catholic vote," the ''German vote." 

The absorbing issue in American 
politics is vice vs VIRTUE. Shall the 



THE PREACHER IN POLITICS. 



78 



wicked or the righteous rule. It is 
the plain duty of every preacher of the 
gospel of purity to enter the field of 
politics and never to leave it, unless 
he shall forget the dignity of his sta- 
tion — forget that God expects him to 
help bring a millennium of virtue and 
intelligence, and make "the kingdoms 
of this world the kingdom of our Lord's 
Christ." 
A preacher is a citizen, and as long 



as he is a citizen, on him devolves the 
duties of citizenship 

My plea is for principle and not for 
party; for integrity, and not for ism; 
for the interest of the many, as op- 
posed to the few; for righteousness, as 
opposed to rudeness, that we may en- 
joy the prosperity of heaven. 

Duty to your fellows and to God, de- 
mands active operation of the preacher 
in politics. 



1M laBor Question. 



Jno. vi, 28. Matt, xxi, 28. Acts x. 35. 

This is a many-sided question, and 
one that indirectly comprehends ail of 
the other issues of the present time. 

The sociological problems of today 
are not to find their final and complete 
solution in party politics: nor in any or 
all of the existing political parties of 
the age; nor in any series of legislative 
enactments, though we can. and doubt- 
less shall, receive material aid from 
these sources. 

The sorrow of our social order is, not 
so much the need of reconstuction, as 
refounding. Having separated our- 
selves from God it is but natural that 
we should also separate.- 

The rebellion of man has turned the 
love that was nature, and all of heaven 
to stern severity. 

The fruitful land is turned into a 
bramble and in the sweat of man's face 
he must eat bread, or go hungry: but 
love is remotely promised in "the 
woman's seed."' 

It is now a contest between Christ 
andCain, — right and wrong. 

Business is now put upon a competi- 
tive basis: activity is made the law of 
life, and stagnation is death. — • 'Man's 
days are labor and sorrow." Ps 90. 

He who is at once the son of God and 
the son of man, came into the world to 
show what is divine in man, to show us 
"a more excellent way," and to estab- 
lish forever the true law of life, viz: 
Love. 

*Preached at Stillwater. O. T.. July 14. 



I. "THAT WE MIGHT WORK THE 
WORKS OF GOD." 

Labor is honorable. Jesus Christ- 
dignified it at the carpenter's bench. 
"I must do the work of him that sent me 
while it is day." "Go work today in my 
vineyard." "If any will not work nei- 
ther shall he eat." 

To say a man is ' "getting up in the 
world" is fallacious. No. it is worse: 
it is an untruth. 

To change from one vocation to 
another is not "getting- up." He only 
is "up" in any true sense who fills well 
his station in life, and only he is down 
who fails to do his duty. 

It is not only necessary that a man 
labor, but he must be remunerated for 
his toil. 

"The laborer is worthy of his meat.*" 
"The husbandman that laboreth must- 
first be partaken of the fruits." — But 
the problem of theunemployecl is what 
now confronts us. 

Thousands upon thousands roam the 
streets and public thoroughfares in 
search of work and find it not.- hence 
the text that "I might work" is sent up 
as the desire of giant hearts, but the 
echo "no man hath hired us." 

I do not believe in secularizing the 
house of God, and the sacred desk, but 
secular subjects that touch and wound 
the sacred precincts of the homes and 
burden the hearts of the parishioners 
must be solved by the church. 

What is the argument against the 
solution of these subjects by the church 



THE LABOR PROBLEM. 



— the grandest body of the best men 
that the world has ever known? 

I can conceive of no valid grounds 
of objection. 

True, the world has the ligh't of 
learning, experience, and reason, but 
the church has these and more — the 
light of revelation — the light that 
cometh down from above, from the 
Father of lights with whom is no shad- 
ow of turning. 

Selfishness being the rule of business, 
men hire as low as they can and as a 
result men do as little as they can for 
their money. 

The system that has brought this 
condition has two faults; one is the 
spirit kindled in the laborer, the other 
the disregard or lack of regard for the 
laborer. 

The system has caused men to think 
that they do too much for their pay. 

The employer looks upon the labor- 
ers as so many machines, and proposes 
to get all he can for the money invest- 
ed. 

This is followed by reduced wages 
and increased hours of, labor and this 
in turn by stikes and boycotts. 

Strikes are not new things as some 
would seek to persuade you. 

T^he first stike was three hundred 
years beforo Christ, when the flute- 
players of Rome went out., 

It has ever since been epidemic — 
especially with church choirs. 

It is true , there are many inconsis- 
tencies among laborers. Many live 
beyond their means and many squan- 
der their earnings by speculation, 
gambling and drink. Of this the 
kk Ramshorn" aptly says: "The labor 
question 'will never be closed as long 
as the saloon stays open." 

But the inconsistencies do not extend 
to the entire laboring class and can in 



no wise account for all of the laborer's 
sorrows. 

The trouble is in the social and 
economic system upon which we stand. 

Tariff is an attempt to remedy the 
evils of the competitive system, by lim- 
iting the area of competion; but it is 
only an attempt as it does not limit 
the entries, nor provide sales. And 
we are still laboring beside the people 
(imported) from whom we have sought 
to protect ourselves. 

But the Guerry Law and the Golden 
Rule cannot flourish together. 
II. THAT I MIGHT WORK THE WORKS 
OF GOD. 

"Go work today in my vineyaad." 

There is either lack of money or lack 
of -disposition to invest, and so a lack 
of employment, but in the vineyard of 
the Lord is ample opportunity for every 
idle hand. 

Go work in my vineyard don't mean 
dig ditch. 

God's vineyard is the world. 

Our duty is to Christianize it, edu- 
cate it, illumine it. 

Anything that makes men happy 
without making them bad, is God's 
work. 

But there are comparatively few 
who have heard the call for the reap- 
ers. Ninety-live per cent of the poor 
and ninety per cent of the middle class 
are non-churchmen. 

Chicago has a church attendance of 
183,700 and a non-attendance of 1,316,- 
300, and why? Because we have had 
little sympathy with the poor. 

Jesus has said, "Have I not chosen, 
the poor of this world rich in faith. 

The saloon is one of our most expen- 
sive luxuries. Though the laborers do 
not by any means consume all of the 
iquor yet they pay the bill. 



90 



THE LABOR PROBLEM. 



The saloon controls politics, by con- 
trolling- the votes of the men with 
uncontroled appetites. 

I am not now to discuss the liquor 
problem. I only mention its bearing 
on labor. Its indirect costs are for 
Pauperism caused by it $ 8 000 000 

Insanity 17 000 000 

Crime 37 000 000 

Sickness 100 000 000 

Lost labor 

of liquor dealers, 300 000 000 
caused by drinking, 440 000 000 

Direct cost, $1 000 000 000 

Lives, annually 100 000 

Both the cause and cure of this, are 
already in sight. It is a matter of 
your own choice. 

You say "keep away" while you 
keep the place of sin uncovered — a 
maelstrom of expense, disease and 
death, with all the deceptiveness of a 
serpent at the feet of your children. 

For this curse the church is directly 
chargeable. 

There are enough votes of those pro- 
fessing Godliness to silence forever 
this incubus on society and labor. 

One other sorrow that I now wish to 
mention, is peculiar, especially, to this 
country — syndicates. 

Under our "ring system" of govern- 
ment, boards of trade and corporations 
nourish. They flourish as a result of 
the limited number of people connect- 
ed with certain branches of business, 
and thus our markets are not governed 
directly — not wholly so at least — by 
supply and demand. 

Hence, fictitious demands are often 
created as well as fictitious supplies — 
watered stock. 

The price of labor, of produce, and 
of money, is now almost directly under 
the control of a few. 



Most accursed system! The com- 
petitive system! Its path is thronged 
with ten thousand horrors, and is full 
of pitfalls. It inspires supreme selfish- 
ness. 

It is a direct thrust at the fundamen- 
tal doctrine of sociological order and 
peace: the words of Abraham to Lot 
and of Otterbein to Boehm, "We are 
brethren.** As long as competition 
holds the sceptre, peace can be little 
more than an empty name, for this sys- 
tem makes every man the foe of every 
other man. 

The solution of this whole affair is 
clearly hinted at in my last text — "He 
that feareth God and worketh right- 
eousness is accepted with him.*' 

This is "the works of God.*' 
.Our great example went about do- 
ing good. 

When labor gives honest service and 
receives an honest reward, then, and 
not till then, will the problem be 
solved. 

Capital has gone to one pole and la- 
bor to the other. They are now en- 
emies when they should be friends. 
Capital being to labor as the exponent 
to the letter, to heighten its value and 
power. 

It is the equatorial zone of love and 
righteousness that both of these ele- 
ments must enter, and nothing but the 
fear of God and the love of right can 
ever dislodge them from their frigid 
spheres and move them toward each 
other. 

Strikes and riots are unfortunate for 
the cause of labor: investigation for 
capital. 

I am come to plead for peace and 
righteousness. I want no war but of 
words, no God but love: no king but 
Reason: no priest but Truth. 



SoDgg. 



"My money is restored."— Gen 42, 28. 

This is an awful question, this money 
question. 

Money is the deity of many; the 
price of produce, of labor, of virtue 
and even life. 

A bit of it is the price of many a wit- 
ness; it influences courts and acquits 
criminals. 

This standard of , measure, in the 
field of values, was established by hu- 
man hands, but the creature has 
become ruler of the creator instead of 
servant, and is proving a most heart- 
less tyrant. 

Money is denned by Webster as " a 
piece of metal, as gold; silver, copper, 
etc., coined or stamped, and issued by 
the sovereign authority as a medium 
of exchange in financial transactions 
between citizens and the government; 
also, any number of such pieces; coin. 

Any written or stamped promise, 
certificate, or order, as a government 
note, a bank note, a certificate of de- 
posit, etc.^ which is payable in stan- 
dard coined money, and is lawfully 
current in lieu of it; in a comprehen- 
sive sense, any currency usually and 
lawfully employed in buying and sell- 
ing. 

Whatever, among barbarous nations, 
is used as a medium of effecting ex-* 
change of property and in the terms of 
which values are reckoned, as sheep, 
wampum, copper rings, quills of salt or 
gold dust, shovel blades, etc., is in 
common language, called money." 

From Websters definition it would 



seem clear that anything bearing the 
stamp or coinage of the sovereign au- 
thority, is money. 

So far as I can ascertain Bible mon- 
ey was hard money — metal money, and 
was measured by weight: the ratio of 
value is not given. 

Most of the money of the Bible was 
silver. 

The word money (Keseph) (silver) 
appears in Genesis 31 times; Exodus 
14 times; Leviticus 5 times; Numbers 
5 times; Deuteronomy 8 times; Judges 
3 times; 1st and 2d Kings 21 times; 
Chronicles 7 times; Ezra 1 time; Ne- 
hemiah 3 times; Esther 1 time; Job 
1 time; Psalms 1 time; Proverbs 1 
time; Ecclesiastes 2 times; Isaiah 5 
times; Jeremiah 4 times; Lamentations 
1 time; Micah 1 time. Kesaph, evi- 
dently a corruption of Keseph, appears 
once in Ezra. 

A qesitah, a silver coin, Genesis 1, 
Jobl. 

• N. T. Argurion, Matt. 4. Mark 1. 
Luke 4. Acts 2. 

(Kirma — small coin) Jno. 2, 15. 

(Nomisma — small coin) Matt 1. 
Total, 134. 119 have direct reference 
to silver. 

(Chalkos— copper) Interpreted brass, 
Mark, twice. 

There are about 345 different ref- 
erences to silver, and 365 to gold. 

Gold is principally referred to in Ex- 
odus, Kings and Chronicles, where it 
occurs about 70 times each, and refers 
to the tabernacle. 

Gold was for ornaments; copper and 
silver for money. 



SgrmonBtfes. 



; THANKSGIVING, 1898. 

TEXT: "Blessed is the nation whose 
God is the Lord: and the people whom 
he hath chosen for his own inher- 
itance." Ps. 33, 12. 

"Oh, give thanks unto the Lord." 
Ps. 105, 1. 

EXORDIUM: In the God of a na- 
tion, or of an individual, • is the source 
of blessing or happiness; and seeing 
"there are Gods many and Lords 
many: ,; and that these differ, widely in 
form and in nature, the happiness de- 
rived from their worship might well 
be expected to differ widely in nature 
and form. Much time might be given 
to the various forms of worship, but I 
shall call your attention to a few of 
these and leave you to complete the 
suggested lines of thought. 

Before the advent of Buddhism, 
Brahminism had for centuries been 
the religion of India, and is today. 

Brahmins believe in the trasmig ra- 
tion of the soul through various forms 
of animal life: Perfect bliss being at- 
tained, when we at last become uncon- 
scious. Buddhism is founded on the 
same principle of philosophy, their 
difference being in the simplicity of 
the Buddhistic worship. In this faith 
there are one hundred and thirty-six 
hells for the punishment of the wick- 
ed, while heavens are offered in great 
numbers to those who are good. 

Confucianism is practically a religion 
of the past. Though it has many ex- 
cellent precepts, it makes only 



imitators of its devotees. 

Then, there is Egypt with her As- 
trology; the Mohammedan with his 
Koran: Zoroaster devoutly kneeling 
before the splendid sunrise; Israel as 
a sheep among wolves; Joseph Smith 
with his copper plates, and Mrs. Eddy 
with — well, with nothing. 

Let us now turn our attention to a 
people, who bow not the knee, ig- 
norantly, neither . revel in the wild 
sports of the Gladitorial circle, ' but 
whose "delight is in the law of Lord." 

First: The nation whose God the 

* Lord is : — 

To the nations of earth. God has 
said, as to individuals. "Thou shalt 
love the Lord." "Blessed is. the na- 
tion whose God is the Lord, and the 
people whom he hath chosen for his 
own inheritance. "" 

The history of a nationis the history 
of its individuals. A nation is 'but a 
mass of human beings ■ organized into 
some form of 'government. There is 
no true praise— no thanksgiving — but. 
that of the single heart. 

"Blessed, "" then, is the nation in the 
heart.of whose individuals "the Lord 
is God." 

"Bodily exercise profiteth little, but 
Godliness is profitable unto all things." 
First Timothy 4. S. 

• I am glad today that God has a place 
in our nation, in our thoughts and in 
our hearts: and I rejoice to know, that 
God takes cognizance of the nations of 
the earth: and I feel to say of my na- 
tive land as the Psalmist said of Israel, 
"He hath not dealt so with ar. 



THANKSGIVING, 1893. 



93 



tion." Ps. 147, 20. ' 

The discovery of America was the 
result of religious enterprise. Colum- 
bus goes to search out the : 'Indies," 
form the acquaintance of the inhab- 
itants and convert them to the faith o? 
his sovereign (Catholic faith) the King 
and Queen of Spain. 

When the supposed Indies were 
reached, the crews threw themselves 
upon their faces and reverently gave 
thanks to God. 

This, however, is only a repetition of 
the scene which marked the first 
Thansgiving, when Noah having been 
so many days shut in from the sight Of 
land, comes forth with those who had 
been in the Ark with him, and erects 
an alter, and gives thanks to God. , 

The result of Noah's thanksgiving 
service, was a covenant that has ever 
since blessed the sons of men. 

As the smoke of Noah's thank-offer- 
ing mounted Heavenward on the 
morning breeze "the Lord smelled a 
sweet savor: and the Lord said in his 
heart, I will not again curse the 
ground any more for man's sake; for 
the imagination of man's heart is vile 
from his youth; neither will I again 
smite any more everthing living as I 
have done." 

While the earth remaineth, seed 
time and harvest, and cold and heat, 
and summer and winter, and day and 
night shall not cease. ' ' Genesis 8, 21-2. 
And as the wings of faith bear the 
prayers of Columbus into the presence 
of the most High; methinks I hear God 
say, of the nation that should follow: 
"They shall be my people and I will be 
their God." 

As a nation we began life with about 
a hundred souls. 

The old Mayflower with her precious 
cargo of heroic men and noble princi- 



ples, had scarcely touched the Plym- 
outh rock when the Pilgrims began to 
"thank God and take courage." 

This thanksgiving and courage- 
taking is the secret of the life of the 
Puritan Fathers. In the spirit of de- 
pendence they ]aid their hands in that 
of God, who led them conquerors over 
the adversities of that sterile climate 
and unbroken soil; and by them has 
given tone to our, national institutions 

I rejoice that the spirt of the Pil- 
grim-fathers — which spirit is manifest 
in the following— still lingers. 

These are the farewell words of, 
Robinson to those who sailed on the 
May Flower: "I charge you before 
God and his blessed angels, that you 
follow me no further than you have 
seen me follow the Lord Jesus Christ." 
The Lord has more truth to break 
forth put of his holy word. I cannot 
sufficiently bewail the condition of the 
reform churches, who are come to a 
period in religion and will go at pres- 
ent no further than the instruments of 
their reformation. 

Luther and Calvin were great and 
shining lights in their time, yet they 
penetrated not into the whole counsel 
of God. I beseech you, remember it— ■ 
'tis an article of your church covenant 
— that you be ready to receive whatev- 
er truth shall be made known to you 
from the written word of God. 

Says Bancroft: "Every enterprise Of 
the Pilgrims began of God." 

Thanks be to him that sitteth on the 
Throne this has been our history as a 
nation. Says Dr. Gray: "It is utterly 
impossible to tell the story of Amer- 
ican history, while ignoring the 
element of religion. The only com- 
mon bond which runs through the 
biographies of American explorers, 
pioneers and founders of States, is the 



94 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 



thread of Christian faith — the power 
of a religious purpose." 

God is recognized in our Constitution 
and his moral law is back of our civil 
code; while the ethics of the "great 
teacher'' is moulding our society. 

In accordance with a motion by Ben- 
jamin Franklin "that henceforth 
prayers, imploring the assistance of 
Heaven and its blessings on our de- 
liberations, be held in this assembly — 
Constitutional convention — every 
morning before we proceed to busines;" 
prayer has been offered in our legisla- 
tive assemblies. In our armies too, 
men are selected to beseech the aid of 
Almighty God, and even in our prison 
walls; prayer to God, is made. 

In no other nation is business sus- 
pended, and the people called together 
by their chief executive for a day of 
grateful praise. "Oh, give thanks 
unto the Lord, for he is good, for his 
mercy endureth forever." 

Second: Nothing to be thankful 
for: — 

There is no doubt in my mind that 
the devil — for I don't know who else 
would — will suggest to some of you. 
that you have nothing to be thankful 
for. 

He will call your attention to the 
"hard times," stringency of money 
matters; shortness of crops: scarcity of 
work: and your own possibility of want, 
with a thousand other things, but I 
trust that you shall have "grace" and 
"courage" to say: "Get thee behind 
me." 

True, some of these calamities are 
upon us, but there is a cause for it, 
and they are here for a purpose and I 
feel "that these light afflictions which 
are but for a moment" shall "work out 
for us a far more exceeding and eternal 



weight of glory," for I remember it is 
written, "Whom the Lord loveth he 
chasteneth." 

Let us learn a few lessons from by- 
gone days. The Israelites by forsaking 
God sold themselves into oppressive 
bondrge. They w e r e compelled 
"make bricks without straw" 
until their hearts were humblad; then 
God raised them up a leader in the 
person of Moses, who guided them 
safely to a land of peace and plenty. 

They started on their journey with 
fine, yet grateful, humble spirits. 

Soon before them appeared the Red 
Sea and behind them the hosts of 
Pharaoh, but God divided the waters 
and they passed safely through: yet. 
they forgot the loving providence that 
had led them thus far, and murmured 
against God and fell down to idols and 
"many were destroyed of the destroy- 
er." 

Have we not had our Pharaoh in the 
person of Great Britain and in Wash- 
ington our Moses? 

* Have we not been safely and mirac- 
ulously led through the sea of that 
difficulty? but like Israel have we not 
since bowed the knee to idols? 

Look at our— I say OUR— Sunday 
opening of the Fair, the business done 
in this little town, on God's day; the 
curse of alcohol, and the filth of to- 
bacco that is polluting our nation. 

Let us thank God that it is "the 
chastening rod'.'' not "the destroying 
hand." "Be zealous therefore and re-, 
pent" and "take courage." 

It has been said that history repeats 
itself; but in the history of God's deal- 
ings with the sons of men I see but one 
law, which law permeates the whole 
universe — the law of cause and effect — 
"whatever a man soweth that shall he 



THANKSGIVING, 1893. 



95 



reap." Gal. G, 7. 

We have seen the idol worshipper in 
want, ignorance, and depravity; we 
have seen the "nations that wander 
away and forget God topple and fall;" 
and we have seen too, "that they that 
wait upon the Lord renew their 
strength, they mount up with wings as 
eagles, that they run and are not weary; 
walk and faint not;" and we, ourselves, 
have made unprecedented strides in 
science and in art by "looking unto 
Jesus' from whose hand comes "every 
good and perfect gift." 

These things with many others offer 
occasion for devout thanksgiving. 

Third: Reasons for thanksgiving: — 

Christianity is a religion of thanks- 
giving, for it teaches the reality of 
God as a giver of gifts to men. 

The grandest religious assembly of 
earth, was this year held in our 
borders. 

The belching of the cannon, the 
rattle of the musketry, the dull heavy 
tread of infantry, and the clash of 
steel have not been heard in our land 
this year. No scourge of disease has 
been upon us. 

Surely we should be grateful. 

"Gratitude is the fairest flower that 
blossoms in the heart:" but if God has 
not given us our daily bread; then, 
there is no obligation for gratitude: 
But since he has not only given us 
bread, but every pure joy that has 
filled our hearts, we should "praise 
the Lord for his goodness and for his 
wonderful works toward the children 
of men." 

Some ascribe these things to nature; 
but nature 'is not God, it is only the 



gift of God. 

The sun that climbs the eastern hills 
in early spring and smiles so pleas- 
antly on this sphere of ours, awakening- 
new beauty in meadow, hill and plain, 
unstopping the throats of the merry 
birds that have so long been stopped 
by winter's icy fingers: the summer 
with its burning sun and waving corn: 
the autumn with its golden harvest and 
its sparkling frosts: the glittering 
hosts that patrol the Heavens in the 
silent watches of the night, and the 
spotless snow of the winter; are but so 
many voices raised in honor to God, 
and these amazing presents are but 
tokens of his still greater gift — eternal 
life. 

How shall we thank him sufficiently 
for such blessings? 

Our higest appreciation of his good- 
ness can only be shown by giving him 
ourselves — the service of our hands, 
not our lips, only — "Deeds, are fruits, 
words are but leaves" — for until we 
give ourselves we have given nothing. 
"Oh, give thanks unto the Lord for 
praise is comely to the upright. " 
Peroration: 

"While the earth remaineth, 
seed time and harvest, day and 
night, heat and cold, summer and win- 
ter," come and go: and while Heaven's 
gentle breezes unfurls to the world the 
stars and stripes we love so well, may 
the air not cease to vibrate with songs 
of SAveetest praise to Him, who has 
blessed our nation and chosen us for 
his own inheritance. 

"If wisdom, strength or riches be thy lot, 
Boast not; but rather think thou hast the-m not. 
One God alone from whom those gifts proceed, 
Is wise, is mighty, and is rich indeed." 



96 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 

"Rejoice Evermore."— 1 Thes. v, 16. 

A great many people wear "Blue 
Glasses." You know how these will 
darken a brilliant day; so do these 
melancholy Spirits (that is what I mean 
by Blue Glasses) darken the brightest 
experiences of Life. 

For over sixty centuries the world 
has been in tears. Our ears have heard 
little but sobs and moans and sighs. 
Most of our eyes have seen the storm- 
cloud with its awful threatening of de- 
vastation, the electric flame of anger, 
but have never beheld the gracious 
shower that followed. Most of us be- 
moan every loss of pleasure or wealth, 
together with all manner of accident, 
Saying: "What a pity;" never thinking 
what a mercy that the loss or the acci- 
dent was so slight; thus we turn life's 
golden lessons to the wall, and behold 
only the unpolished side of the frames 
that contain them. 

This world is full of woe, but heaven 
is full of joy; and God offers to trans- 
port somewhat of heaven to earth if we 
will make room for it. God says 
"Laugh," and we cry; "Sing," and we 
sigh, "Rejoice," and behold we weep: 
but the reasons are obvious. 

1. — The world's ingratitude— its head 
aches and its heart aches. 

It is impossible for selfish and proud 
dispositions to praise. Praise is con- 
trary to the very bent of such a dispo- 
sition. Cautious dispositions seldom 
praise. They lack the enthusiasm. To 
those in whom the sense of suffering is 
greater than the sense of gratitude; 
those who are more sconcious of the 
weight that is pressing them down, 
than the divine hand that is sustaining 
them, praise is almost impossible. The 
things that please them bear a small 



proportion to those that annoy. Care 
rocks the infants cradle, checks the in- 
nocent child in its frolic: uproots the 
flowers and furrows over the fair plea- 
sure grounds of youth; it crushes the 
heart of the business man in its iron 
hand, and carves deep lines in the faces 
of the aged. In fact life seems to be: 

"To stumble on and never rest, 
To wander with no hand to guide; 

To clasp a lover to thy breast, 
And see her wither at thy side. 

"To scale high heaven with daring thought, 
Then like a bird with broken wing, 

To brood in the dust unsought, 
A weary, 3 r earning, helpless thing. 

"To thrill to childhood's happy laugh, 
To mourn the feeble plant of age; 

Then read the graven epitaph, 
On dissolution's mable page." 

Every thing about us is souled. with 
pathos. Care gnaws with a serpents 
tooth into the hearts of brave men. and 
chill with icy breath, the blood of cow- 
ards. There is little-to satisfy the soul's 
appetite here. We have been running 
wild in the forests of this world, in a 
vain quest for pleasure and for power, 
roving amid unknown dangers and de- 
delusive phantoms. We have sought 
food and found hunger, for roses and 
found a desert drear. 

"We have followed the foolish fires of 
fancy through a long night only to see 
our vision of pleasure pale as the sun' 
came forth and vanish as the morning 
fog. 

We have been lead of selfishness, in- 
to many a pit from which it is hard to 
extricate one's self. We are constantly 
flying from object to object, only to 
find repeated disappointment. - Shad- 
ows and hopes delude us until we lie 
down in dispair and death. The sor- 
row of the world worketh death — death 
to hope, to joy. to the soul. Hence 
manv become morose, beofin finding 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 



97 



fault and actually become pesamistic. 
In the anguish of th'eir hearts they cry 
out, "Who' will show us any good;" 
"Vanity of Vanities, all is vanity and 
vexation of Spirit." After' a heavy 
sigh you may hear, "All is lost." "Man 
that is born of woman is of but few days 
and full of trouble." "A world of sor- 
row." "Ye shall mourn and weep." 
"We are born to sorrow as the sparks. 
that fly upward." 

Fault finding is a disease and com- 
plaining is fatal; God knoweth our 
frames that we are but dust, and he 
has been watching these tear drops, 
and these bleeding hearts;' has been 
listening to these despondent sighs and 
the moans of the sick chamber and now 
he speaks: "Sin has caused all your 
sorrow but now is my son become the 
propitiation for your sins, and not for 
yours only, but also for the sins of the 
whole world. Rejoice' and be exceed- 
ing glad'— rejoice evermore." "You 
Irave hanged your harp on the willows 
aild attempted to sail life's dark sea in 
silence." ' 

"Awake your heart to joyful lays, 
'Twill help you march on dreary days,, 
, | Tet mot sorrow dim your eye, 
Soon shall every tear be dry." 

SORROW ' MAY AFTER ALL .HAVE' A 
NOBLE 'MISSION. 

The disappointments of this world 
may turn our eyes toward another; a 
world, 'Of beauty and of life, and even 
become cause for rejoicing. J. Russell 
Lowell says: 

"Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up, 
Whose golden rounds are our calamities, 
Whereon our firm feet planting, nearer God 
The. Spirit climbs, and hath its eyes unsealed." 

"When we are in trouble we[can seek 
God earnestly and why should we not 



glorify Him after that he hath deliver- 
ed us? Shall God's mercies to us ward 
be as showers on barren rocks — mak- 
ing no impression— or like letters writ- 
ten in the waters, leave no marks be- 
hind? Shall we still go on complain- 
ing? Alas for the capital crime of 
God's people — barrenness of praise. In- 
gratitude and unholiness are bracketed 
together in scripture as cause and ef- 
fect. "O that men would praise the 
Lord for his goodness and for his won- 
derful works to the children of men." 

"Sail on through storm and loss, 

Through turbulence and gain, 
lifting aloft the Cross, 

The sign of love and pain." 
O, Soul of man sail on 

Across life's solemn sea; 
Thought great the storm and strong, 

Short shall its ragings be; 
Bear well thy cross, ere long, 

The calm will come to thee.— MesaroS. 

2. — The Power of Praise— Rejoicing. 

My text asks every mail to become an 
optomist here and now — rejoice ever- 
more, pray without ceasing, and in 
everything give thanks. : Livingston 
said': "I am persuaded that a line of 
praise is worth a leaf of prayer, and 
that an hour of praise is worth a day 
of fasting and mourning." "O that 
men would praise the Lord for His 
goodness to the children of men." 

Just as spring is to the outburst of 
summur so is worship to the Divine of 
humanity. "If you are brought to bear 
persecutions, rejoice and be exceeding- 
glad for great is your reward in heav- 
en," True there is a time to mourn as 
well as to rejoice, but nowhere are we 
told to mourn evermore, but we are 
often warned lest we come to thus 
mourn. Praise to God is the choicest 
sacrifice of Worship — Charnock. And 
why should we not praise him? Listen to 
His blessed promises: "It is better to 



98 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 



trust in God than to put confidence in 
men.'' ''Trust in the Lord and do 
good and verily thou shalt be fed."' 
And again. "Fear not, for I have re- 
deemed thee. I have called thee by thy 
name: thou art mine. When thou pas- 
seth through the waters, I will be with 
thee, and through the rivers they shall 
not overflow thee: when thou walkest 
through the fire thou shalt not be 
burned: neither shall the flames kindle 
upon thee, for I am the Lord thy God, 
the holy One of Israel, thy Savior." 

It is not mere poetry but a potent 
fact, that a whole assembly praising 
God is like a little heaven below. A 
congregation of human hearts, agree- 
ing together to sing forth their living- 
human affection to the one object of 
their love is always the house of God 
and the gate of heaven. Such a con- 
gregation powerfulty attracts heaven 
to itself as like to like. With a de- 
viner love and greater unity in the 
church it might easily occur again that 
the joy would be too great, the glory 
too great, and the God of glory too ful- 
ly present for the ordinary service. 
Even as a flood carries awav all sign- 
posts, driftwood and barriers of all 
descriptions, sweeping over all distinc- 
tions of path, or field or hedg-e: so 
would an unusual descent of the Holy 
Ghost, and the joy of God and his sal- 
vation upon the church, set at naught 
the mechanical order of our service 
and bear away both priest and people 
as the tide of one resistless impulse of 
praise. 

Or the presence might be tco over- 
whelming, utterance might be choked 
and we all alike wait in awe and si- 
lence, and with reverent joy for the 
passing - over of the tide of glory. It 
happened — God grant it hero — in 
the Hebrew temple one time. 



% 'It came to pass as the trumpeters 7 
and the singers were as one to make 
one sound to be heard in thanking and 
praising the Lord and w r hen they lift- 
ed up their voice with their trumpets 
and symbols, and instruments of music 
and praised the Lord saying, for He is 
good for His mercy endureth forever; 
then the house was filled with a cloud, 
even the house of the Lord, so that the 
priest could stand to minister by rea- 
son of the cloud for the glory of the 
Lord had filled the house of God. 
Make the land to abound with praise 
and it will also abound with grace. 
Enoph said: "I shall never be found 
wanting in my acknowldegements to- 
the gods and it even troubleth me that 
we cannot make a suitable return for 
the benefits they have conferred upon 
us. 

4.— Cause for Rejoicing. 

Rejoicing- is the overflowing expres- 
sion of our affection — wonder at the 
goodness of God, in recognition of the 
gifts of God, in seeing God in all things- 
— the language of the redeemed sinner. 

Inasmuch as we are sinners and have 
forfeited the blessings which we daily 
receive, what can be more suitable" 
than that we should humbly thank that 
Almighty Power from which comes 
such an inexhaustible supply of good- 
ness God has not turned His face from 
us, nor has He turned us out with 
Nebuchadnezzar to eat grass with the 
beasts of the 'field. We have our 
health and our homes. Comparatively 
few of us have been called upon to fol-' 
low the weary march of a funeral pro- 
cession. We have produced enough, 
upon which to subsist. 

The financial sky is just now bright 
ening. Peace has reigned throughout 
our countrv the most of the year. The 



THANKSGIVING, 1894. 



99 



strikes that seemed to threaten not only 
our commercial interest but our na- 
tional life has been quite amicably 
adjusted and while the air of Corea 
has been filled with the smell of gun- 
powder, our atmosphere has been 
scented with roses and new-mown hay. 
Every beem of light that delights our 
eyes; every breath of air that refreshes 
our spirit; every drop of water that 
cools our thirst; every minute of com- 
fortable repose; every step that we 
safely take: every truth that we have 
gleaned; every pound that we have 
gained; every dollar that we have had; 
every pleasure that has thrilled our 
hearts has been the gift of God, who is 
the Giver of every good and perfect 
gift and when added to an assu- 
rance of an "inheritance, incorruptible 
undefiled and that fadeth not away, 
should be sufficient cause for rejoicing 
' evermore. 

This is a day. of gladness, of thanks- 
giving. "Plato looking through the 
dim spectacles of Nature gave thanks 
to God for three things; 1st, that God 
created him a man and not a beast; 
2d, that he was born a Grecian and 
not a barbarian; not only so but a phi- 
losopher also. But Christians should 
turn the stream of their thankfulness 
into another and deeper channel. 1st, 
that God has created them after his 
own image; 2d, that he has called them 
from darkness into the marvellous 
light of the sun of righteousness. 

That he has adopted them into the 
heavenly family, 'being now the sons of 
God, with somewhat of his kingdom — 
which is truth, righteousness, joy and 
.peace in the Holy Ghost — within us, 
being able to say, tho life I now live in 
the flesh I live by the faith of the Son 
of God who loved me and gave Himself 
for me. 



Isaac Walton said, "God has two 
dwellings, one in heaven and the other 
in meek and thankful hearts. 



3.— Our Blindness to Blessing. 

Some persons seem not to discern any 
cause for joy and thanksgiving. On 
this Holmes says, "If one would give 
a dish of sand, and tell me there were 
particles of iron in it, I might feel for 
them in vain, but let me take a mag- 
net and sweep through it and how 
would that draw to itself the most in- 
visible particles by the mere power of 
attraction? The unthankful heart like 
my fingers in the sand, discovers no 
mercies, but let the thankfui heart 
sweep through the day, and as the- 
magnet finds the iron, so it will find in 
every hour some heavenly blessing — 
only the iron in God's sand is gold." 
I suppose some of the defeated candi- 
dates have been unsuccessfully finger- 
ing the sand with little disposition to 
thanksgiving; but here is encourage- 
ment for them, a good, honest Dutch- 
man in breaking his leg in a falling 
from the mainmast exclaimed, ' ; what 
a mercy it was not my neck!" Thank- 
fulness is uneasy until it has ackowl- 
edged a kindness; gratitude, until it 
has repaid it.. 

Thankfulness -impresses the world. 
I enjoy seeing religious people bright, 
cheery, agreeable. Dullness and mo- 
roseness are of the devil and long 
facedness is not only not religion but a 
dangerous kind of hypocrisy which 
never deceives any one but they that 
practice it. A holy and good life anima- 
ted by the sense of our obligation to the 
Divine Goodness is a kind of perpetual 
hymn of praise to God. The physi- 
cian judges the condition of men's 
hearts by the pulse which he feels in. 
their arms, and not by the words 



100 



THANKSGIVING. 15C4. 



which proceed from their mouths.' So 
we judge the thankfulness of men by 
their lives rather than their profes- 
sions. "The jov of the Lord is our 
strength." It fortifies the soul and in- 
fuses a courage and vigor unknown to 
others which makes it victorious over 
all the powers of the enemy. Nothing 
can improve the mind of men like sa- 
cred joy; like the contemplation of 
God and delighting in Him. But I 
would have you escape a fatal error. 
Do not think, as too many do, that you 
can praise God by singing hymns on 
Sunday and disobeying Him all the 
week. He asks of you works as well as 
words — works first and words after- 
wards. 

Peroration:— 

John Foster says: "All pleasure 
must be bought at the price of pain. 



The only difference between false and 
true pleasure is, that for the true the 
pries is paid before you enjoy it — for 
the false after you enjoy it." 

A thankful heart with which to 
thank God is the greatest of all bless- 
ings. Then let us work, uot worry; la- 
bor, not loaf. Evermore rejoice for 
Christ has said, "I go to prepare a 
place for you." "In my Father's house 
are many mansions." ''Lot not your 
heart be troubled, neither let it be 
afraid." In view of these things we 
should be able to repeat with jubilant 
hearts: 

I am but a stranger here; 

Heaven is my home. 
Earth is a desert drear; 

Heaven is my home. 
Danger and sorrow stand 
'Round me on every hand, 
Heaven is my fatherland; 

Heaven is my home. 



KMsfmas irGgfing, 



TEXT: "Fear not; for, behold, I 
bring you* good tidings of great joy, 
which shall be to all people." — Luke ii, 
10. 

EXORDIUM: 

Ever since the close of the glorious 
day that dawned upon our foreparents, 
when the shades of night had spread 
their mantles o'er the race, men have 
been straining their powers of vision 
to behold, somewhere, along the line 
of their horizon, the promised Day 
Star. 

Darker and yet darker grew the 
lonely night of anxiety — for even had 
the light of prophecy gone out— but 
still, with the tenacity of life, was held 
the original promise of the Savior — 
''That the- seed of the woman should 
bruise the serpent's head." As the 
last dim, glimmering ray of prophetic 
light goes out, despondency seems to 
seize the people and many go away in- 
to idolatry. But the faithful shep- 
herds on Judea's mountains bleak and 
wild cease not to look for the promised 
deliverer. 

At last Hope hears the rustling of 
far-off wings and they eagerly listen 
for the heaven-born strain, "Joy to the 
world," that they may know a "Savior 
reigns." 

As on Judea's bleak and rugged hills 
the shepherds watch their flocks, there 
comes to the sheep of Israel, a shep- 
herd of the heavenly world, and the 



stars — for it was the dawning of a 
brighter day — sang together for glee: 
"Behold, I bring you good tidings of 
great joy, * * * * for unto you is born 
this day in the city of David a Savior, 
which is Christ the Lord." 

1. I Bring You. 

The EGO herein mentioned is a cit- 
izen of those heavenly courts, whose 
face shines with all the refulgent lus- 
ter of the brightness of the eternal 
glory world, on whose garments 
are no defilement, whose eye 
sparkles with delight to make known 
the message that he brings — "Good ti- 
dings of great joy"— words of salvation. 

It is. just like God to always be 
bringing us something — some of the 
rare beauties, the rich glories, the 
sweet peace of the heavenly Jerusa- 
lem. The angels are ministering spir- 
its, ever bringing us joy, "good 
tidings," messages of love, words of 
promise, tokens of grace. 

But what do we send in return? 

Aye, too often they return unbur- 
dened—not so much as a tribute of 
respect do we send by them. 

Not to Jew alone, nor to shepherd 
alone, but "unto you is the word of sal- 
vation sent. " — Acts xiii, 17. 

Not a sad and doleful tale, not the 
story of a wonderful tragedy, not the 
romantic dream of a fertile imagina- 
tion, not the chains of bondage, nor th G 



102 



CHRISTMAS GREETING. 



army of war. but "good tidings of great 
joy." 

Not alone men, but the whole uni- 
verse was made to rejoice, in so much, 
that the morning stars sang together 
for glee "The Lord is come, let Earth 
receive her king.'' 

Not to him whose coffers are filled 
with glittering gold, or whose name 
has been heralded from pole to pole as 
great and learned, but unto YOU, the 
humble shepherds, is brought "good 
tidings of great joy." Fear not, I 
bring you not a message of wrath, a 
proclamation of vengeance, but of joy 
— the Gospel. 

2. The Gospel a Joyful Message. 

Nothing ever has or can gladden the 
homes or hearts of men as the gospel 
of Christ the Lord, which brings life 
and immortality to light. The full- 
ness of the gospel is manifest in the an- 
gel ic announcement to the shepherds, 
"Unto you is born this day in the city 
of David a Savior which is Christ the 
Lord."' 

The last glittering ray of hope had 
been bedimmed and the dark mantle of 
despair o'ershadowed the entire cano- 
py: but now, upon the ear which had 
not for centuries fallen the vibration 
of a joyful sound, falls the melodies of 
heave:], in a Savior's name, "Christ 
Jesuj the Lord." To those who "'sat 
ni darkness a great light is sprung up,'' 
even "the light of the world," which 
if a man follow, "he shall not walk in 
darkness, but shall have the light of 
life." — Jue. viii, 12. 

At the midnight hour, 
When the busy world was still, 
The words of joy came from afar, 
And to the manger guides the star. 

In the oxe's manger where 
Lay the child with beauty rare, 
The ray of light 



To cheer the night 
That burst into eternal day; 
The spark, which fanned by passion's blast, 
Leaped a flame to heaven at last. 

"That light was not to guide the few, 
but all people into great joy and peace 
in the Holy Ghost; and to a mansion 
and inheritance that is incorruptible, 
undefiled and fadeth not away; in % 
country whose maker and ruler is God. 

Or to express it in the language of 
the heavenly host, "Gloi*y to God in 
the highest, peace on earth, good will 
to men." 

The shepherds at once tested the 
truthfulness of the angelic announce- 
ment by hastening to the manger 
where they found all things as had 
been told them. 

They soon returned praising and glo- 
rifying God even as those who now 
"behold the Lamb of God which ta- 
keth away the sins of the world. ''— Jno. 
i, 29. 

3. The Source of Joy. 

The joy is found in a Savior. A few 
wise men beheld his star in the east 
and came to worship him saying, 
"Where is he who is born King of the 
Jews'?" 

When King Herod heard of those 
things he called together the princes 
and demanded of where Christ should 
be born, and was told in Bethlehem of 
Judea; "for thus it is- written by the 
prophet, 'And thou, Bethlehem, in the 
land of Juda, art not the least among 
the princes of Juda; for out of, thee 
shall come a Governor that shall rule 
my people, Israel.' " — Matt. ii. 5-7. 
Herod feared for his kingdom, and 
sought the young child's life* but God 
takes care of his own. 

"A thousand may fall at my side, 
And ten thousand at my right hand. 

Above me his wings are spread wide. 
Beneath them in safety I stand. 



CHRISTMAS GREETING. 



103 



The lord's our rock, in him we hide, 
Secure whatever ill betide." 

No term applied to our blessed 
Christ-whose incarnation we now cele 
brate — gives to us broader, clearer or 
happier conceptions of his nature than 
the one used in this announcement, "A 
Savior born." 

We are wont, like the wise men to 
think of him as a King, a great teach- 
er, a mysterious persoage. We seldom 
think of Jesus as we should. Few of 
us get at all clear conceptions of him. 

"And the child (Jesus) grew." — Luke 
ii, 40. I like to think of him as a child 
with eyes of blue arid sunny golden hair, 
with rosy cheeks and full of simplicity. 

I love to think of him as a loving 
iriend, a gracious benefactor. Jesus 
says to his people, "I have net called 
you servants, but friends." "The ser- 
vant knoweth not what his lord doeth, 
but all things that I have received of 
my father, have I made known unto you. 

But above, and over all, I like to 
think of him as a present, personal 
Savior. 

"Thou shalt call his name Jesus, for 
he shall save his people from their 
sins," — Matt, i, 21. He is likewise 
able to keep that which we commit to 
his care, against the day of wrath. 

4, Great Joy. 

How great must be the joy of a 
mother at the return of a wayward son; 
a man at the recovery of a lost fortune; 
the boy who excels in books, or the 
girl in arts. 

Who can estimate the joy of Jarius, 
when the Savior called back the spirit 
that had just taken its flight? Who 
can tell the emotion of the widow of 
Nain when Jesus stopped the 
bier and gave her back her son? 
or who can tell the joy of Mary and 
Martha when the brother that had 



lain four days in the tomb came forth? 
But dim indeed, is the picture when 
placed along-side of that which fills 
our hearts, who havefound the pearl of 
great price? He who knows not Christ 
knows not joy unmixed with pain. 

On the mountain of vision brightest glories we 

may see, 
If to Christ the I,ord we'rs looking for the joys 

that will not flee. 
"Full many a glorious morning have I seen 
Flatter the mountain top with sorron eye, 
Kissing with golden face the meadows green, 
Guilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy.' 
—Shakespeare. 

The inexpressible joy of the brook 
dancing o'er its pebbles in the morning 
sunlight, 

The meadow lark with cheery song, 
The oriole warbling loud and long. 

but prefigure the still greater joy 
of him whose faith takes hold on the 
Babe of Bethlehem. "Unto you there- 
fore which believe, he is precious." 
—I Peter ii, 1. His was a life of sol- 
emn duty, filled not with pleasure but 
with pain. "But ye know the grace of 
our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he 
was rich (originally) yet for your sakes 
he become poor that ye through his 
poverty, might be rich." — II Cor. viii, 
9. "He was wounded for our trans- 
gressions, he was bruise for out iniqui- 
ties, the chastisement of our peace was 
upon him and with his stripes we are 
healed." — Isaiah £3, 5. A joyful sound 
— A Savior reigns. 
5. "Which Shall Be to all People," 
Nothing could have been so sad a 
catastrophe as the announcmenfc of a 
Savior to the Jews only. 

The most skeptical and incredulous, 
the most unlearned and vicious, Jew 
and Greek, bond and free, entertain 
alike, a "hope of the glory of God. "He 
is a "light to lighten the Gentiles." 
Not a single church, denomination, or 



104 



CHRISTMAS GREETING. 



people, '"but in every nation he that 
feareth him and worketh righteousness 
is accepted with him," wherefore he 
saith, "Whosover will, let him come." 
Jesus the Christ is for every people, in 
every station of life, in every clime 
and in every age. "Herein is love 
made manifest, not that we loved him, 
but that he loved us and gave himself 
for us, that we through him, might 
live. 

The clouds that decked with azure hue, 



The grass, bespangled bright with dew, 

The birds that twitter in the trees 

The gentle, fanning, summer breeze, 

But speak the name of him above, 

Which name is only written, Love. 

The sky of deep and beauteous blue, 

The trees in green, when decked auew 

And vegetation, looking sees, 

The hand of God, in beasts and bees; 

While all creation lifts above 

Its praise to him whose name is Love. 

"All hail the power of Jesus' name. 
Let axgels prostrate fall; 

Bring forth the royal diadem. 
And crown him Lord of all." 



EowBr of tfie JDYisiBIg, 



And if I be lifted up will draw all 
men unto me. — John 12: 32. 

I would call your special attention 
to the expression "Draw all Men." 

INTRODUCTION. 

It does not seem difficult to tell what 
moves the loaded wagons on our streets; 
or takes a long line of cars, freighted 
with human life, flying 1 across the 
plains, to the great centers of trade, or 
climbing the mountain side, or glid- 
ing through the vale; for there is 
present, what wo ordinarily call, visi- 
ble force. The horses with their strong 
limbs, curved necks and clanking hoofs 
present a formidable force, and the en- 
gine with all its complicated elements 
of machanics, its shafts and cranks and 
ponderous drives, is a potent, pungent, 
power. 

It would not be difficult to see how 
in the suffering of Jesus on Calvary 
many who beheld the scene should be 
drawn to Him in sympathy; or how, He 
should draw men to Himself while He 
walked the sands of Palistine, for three 
and one-half years, but that He should 
still attract men, and that the cross 
which has mouldered in the dust of nine- 
teen centuries is what seems exceeding- 
ly strange to us. The reason it appears 
so; is, that our experience is very lim- 
ited, our views of Life and the universe 
very narrow and superficial. 



The world is full of silent and invisi- 
ble forces. The truth is that only re- 
sults are either visible or audible, and 
these are transitory, but the source 
from which all results must emanate— 
for many causes are only themselves 
results— abides. "The things that are 
seen are temporal, but the things that 
are unseen are eternal." 

It is a very superficial view that 
makes the horse or the engine the 
power. There is something back of all 
this bone and muscle, and the shafts 
and drivers. In the one case there is 
life and will, themselves invisible, and 
in the other, steam. Steam, like elec- 
tricity, is never seen except as it dies, 
and yet they are recognized as two of 
the most powerful things known to 
mankind. 

I can't understand why these things 
— invisible things, gravity, steam, elec- 
tricity, magnetism, sound, heat, coM, 
and thought — should be so powerful, 
but thsee may help us to understand, 
in a measure at least, and to somewhat 
appreciate the drawing of the Son of 
God on human hearts, if we add the 
gospel announcement, that, "Because 
that which may be known of God is 
manifest in them; for God hath shewed 
it unto them. For the INVISIBLE 
things of Him from the foundation 
the world are clearly seen, (by induc- 
tive reason-ing) being understood by 



106 



POWER OP THE INVISIBLE. 



the things that are made, even his eter 
nal power and Godhead; so that they 
are withoutexcuse." — Rom. 1: 19, 20. 

GRAVITY. 

It is gravity that tips the scale beam. 
It's gravity that holds the earth in its 
orbit as it makes its onward march 
around the sun at the wonderful velo- 
city of 19,000 miles an hour. It is 
gravity that "binds the sweet influence 
of Orian," and holds far off Neptune in 
its place. It is gravity that gives sta- 
bility to all our structures and holds all 
our improvements. To gravity you 
owe your life. Gravity is universal. 
Gravity is attraction toward a common 
center. 

Is this to make visible the power of 
the invisible cross? Yes. "I will draw 
all. men unto Me." 

Not all bodies come to the sun yet all 
are drawn toward it, and by it. 

I can't understand it any more than 
I can understand how and why the sun 
stretches out his mighty fingers and 
takes hold on us, but I do know that 
the Son of Rightenous has run his hand 
down through these nineteen centuries 
and that He does bind men with the 
power of His teaching, His life of self- 
denial — His love, until in our thoughts 
and our emotions and no less in our 
conduct, we move about Him. Oh 
that this gravity — love — might have a 
controlling influence in all our lives. 

MAGNETISM. 

Christ is the Magnet that draws. 
You know how a magnet will lift a 
piece of steel. Magnets are always ap- 
plied at a particular point. So when 
the magnetism of the cross is applied 
to a life you can expect, whatever laws 
are acting in opposition, when the life 
is brought near to the great magnet 



that it will be lifted. Did you ever 
place a magnet on one side of a piece 
of paper and a pen on the other, and 
then move the magnet and see the pen 
follow? You can't tell how it is, but 
you know that it is. I don't know how 
it is that though the great unseen 
God is reaching down and lifting me up 
any more than you know how mag- 
netism acts through the paper, but 
thank God, when we put our finger 
of faith against the trolly of God's love 
magnetism binds us fast and the elec- 
tric current of life, new life, moves 
us up the hills of adversity toward 
the city of our God. Have you never 
felt attracted toward the Son of God 
in your thought, in your . character? 
Have you never thought that you would 
like to be real rear to J esus in your 
character, at least, and then in your 
conduct? Remember that you may. 
"Him that cometh to Me I will in no 
wise cast out." "Cast thy burdens up- 
on the Lord, for He will uphold thee, 
He will sustain thee with the right 
hand of His righteousness." 

HEAT. 

You know how the hot winds in a 
few hours blasts the corn and withers 
the blushing fruit. That is. you know 
that it does it. Now you never saw a 
hot wind, a cold, a gravity, a thought, 
a sound, an ache. You know too. that 
temptation, like the withering blast 
from the furnaces of hell, sometimes 
strike us, and all these tell us of the 
power of the invisible. 

But, again, it is the springtime sun 
that warms the old. cold earth into life: 
it is his warm lingers that cheer into 
life and power the little seed, then 
comes the blade, am ilk and the 

ear. 

So the Son of Ri< - mes 






POWER OF THE INVISIBLE. 



107 



and feels about these old, cold, cruel 
hearts of ours that are dead in tress- 
passes and sins and warms them into 
newness of life. I can't tell just how, 
but we can feel the ice melting and the 
frost of death leaving and the soul 
swelling, budding and growing — thank 
God, blooming. The desert shall re- 
joice and blossom like the rose. 

CONCLUSION. 

Moses was faithful in all his house 
and the reason assigned is that "He 
endured as seeing Him who is invis- 
ible." 

Oh that your eyes, dear hearer, might 
be opened to the power of the Ommipo- 
tent God and the legions of angels that 
are watching over you that these invis- 
ible things that are, in a manner seen 
and known might induce you to feel af- 
ter this invisible and eternal God if 
happily you might find Him, seeing He 



is not far from any of you. 

As all our earthly improvements are 
the result of thought, so, also is the 
universe the result of God's thought. 

Thought is the greatest force known 
to humanity. It is often transmitted 
by another invisible force — telegraphy, 
electricity— and appreh ended o by an- 
other invisible intelligence. 

The telephone is another good illus- 
tration of this matter, but here we 
must learn to know the voice if we 
would know who is talking. Oh, talk 
to God, my hearers, until you can rec- 
ognize His voice in nature, in provi- 
dence and in revlation, for so shall you 
be made wise unto salvation which is 
in Jesus Christ, and be furnished with 
eagle wings to beat down another in- 
visible something (air) and so rise 
above the cares of the visible to the 
joys of the invisible. 



Easter Sermon, 



EASTER SERMON. 

Text. — He is not here, for he is 
risen, as he said. Come see the place 
where the Lord lay. — Matt. 28, 6. 

My text this morning might summon 
us to many places were it subtracted 
from, and treated independent of the 
narrative in which it occurs. 

Bethlehem's manger, the Gallilean 
ship, the Mount of Olives and " Jo- 
seph's new tomb," have each in their 
turn been the resting place of the "Son 
of Man." 

Last night, at the close of day re- 
splendant with springtime beauty, and 
noisy with the ring of horses' hoofs, 
the rattle of wagons, the rush and wor- 
ry of business; as thesun turned hisglit- 
tering face from the scenes of earth: 
darkness hovered over us making ex- 
teior objects — as though they were not 
-invisable. Then the candle at our bed- 
side—the last hope of our vision — went 
out, and we could hear nothing but 
the tick! tick! of the old clock on the 
mantle. Oh, how lonely. Our hearts 
seem to sink within us. Sleep has left 
our eye-lids. The silence of death has 
overtaken us. An hour seems an age. 
Oh, we are so lonely. We can do 
nothing but think and are not able to 
think very accurately. Nostralia seiz- 
es us and our hearts cry out: "Oh, that 



I\ could fly to some far-off land, the 
habitation of some loved one, and be 
at rest: or, perad venture, in our dreams 
we are troubled: but erelong the morn- 
ing dawns with the joyous melodies of 

Its singing birds 
And lowing herds; 
Its din and whir 
Of shop and store; 

in short, a resurrection of activity. It- 
was but yesterday humanity stood by 
the -cross of a bleeding and dying 
Christ. The sun closed his iiery eye to 
the awful spectacle, and the earth 
trembled beneath the weight of the 
cross and its sacrifice. The blood trick- 
led from his nail-pierced hands and 
feet, and a cruel crown of thorns pierc- 
ed his brow, while from his lips was 
rent the awful "eloi. eloi. lama, sa- 
bach thani" and "it is finished." But 
his broken body presents only too true 
a picture of the hearts of his now 
lonely followers. The day is fast draw- 
ing to a close and the Arimathean now 
bears the the body "rock-hewn cave." 
The rock of which the women spake in 
Mark 19, 4 saying: "Who shall roll iis 
the stone from the door of the sepul- 
chre" was placed on the cave-mouth. 
The night of sorrow has now overta- 
taken them that ' 'trusted that it was 
He who should have delivered Israel.'* 
but he is dead. Ah how dark! — not one 
ray of hope! Though the night of mis- 



EASTER SERMON. 



109 



apprehension, anxiety, sorrow or doubt 
may be never so long or so dark, the 
morning of encouragement, in which 
nature sings a new song and sad hearts 
are made to leap with joy will surely 
come. 

Death. — Men had been going down 
into death by the million, and not one 
coming back. For thousands of years 
the mighty chasm of the grave had 
been devouring nations and races of 
earth, but not one had ever given a 
wave of the hand or a look to tell the 
effect of death upon the soul. The 
most horrible fears and fancies filled 
the mind; as, step by step, it was forced 
out, shuddering and shrinking into the 
dread unknown. 

Science can define neither life nor 
death. We only know that the spirit 
withdraws and leaves the dwelling un- 
tenanted; the musician stops playing, 
locks his instrument and goes away; 
the king abdicates his sovereignty over 
his earthly domain and departs, and 
presently, the kingdom, with no king 
on the throne, dissolves. The organ 
with no one to play upon it falls to pie- 
ces. The tent abandoned by its ten- 
ants, drops in hopeless ruin to the 
ground. But this affords no reason 
for -thinking the king is dead, the or- 
ganist perished; or .the tenant ceased 
to be. Death is a separation of spirit 
and body. Death hides from our eyes 
"the light of life" but does not put it 
out. 

Joseph has completed his sad but 
loving task of caring for the body of 
the Lord. 

The pale sweet face of the loving 
Master, for whom no journey was too 
long, no labor too wearisome, that 
would benefit poor stricken humanity 
— the brightest light that ever dawned 
on a nation — is sealed up in the grave; 



but no darkness — not even the grave- 
can bind such refulgoncy. For, early 
in the morning, the stone is "rolled 
away," the tomb is empty and the an- 
gels announce to the women the great- 
est of truths: "He is not here; for he 
is risen, as he said. Come see the place 
where the Lord lay." With tearful 
eyes the women ask: "Where have 
they laid him?" But it is no time for 
tearful eyes now. Well may our eyes 
be filled with tears and our hearts with 
sighs while we stand by the sepulchre 
in which lies buried all our hopes; but 
when "the stone is rolled away," and 
out come oar hopes, burnished, bright- 
ened and glittering for eternity, then 
shall be brought to pass the promise 
"but your sorrow shall be turned to 
joy." — Jno. 16: 20. "Weeping may en- 
dure for a night, but joy cometh in the 
morning." — Ps, 30: 5, — "and God shall 
wipe away all tears from their eyes," — 
Rev, 7: 17; and "death is sw r allowed up 
in victory," — 1 Cor. 15: 54. Did you 
^ver stop to think what darkness, and 
despair would settle down upon this 
earth were it not for our resurrection 
hope, in the fact that Christ did rise 
as he said? How I pity the men who 
deny.it, for, like Sampson, they are 
pulling the house down upon their own 
heads. But, think of it? What if 
Christ is not "risen as he said?" Think 
of the plan of redemption as a failure. 
Think of all the sacrifices from the 
blood of murdered Abel to the last 
smoking lamb of the Jewish altar, as 
a failure? Think of the past as a fail- 
ury, the present as a failure, the fut- 
ure a failure; Christ's mission a failure 
and we get only a shadow of what it 
would mean for him not to have risen 
as he said."' Then would our preach- 
ing b© in vain, and your faith would 
also be vain but not all is vain: "Come 



110 



EASTER SERMON. 



see the place where the Lord lay." 

One thoroughly authenticated res- 
urrection lightens all the darkness of 
earth, the grave and the beyond. The 
testimony of angels, the broken seal of 
the sepulchre, the affrighted guard, the 
the trembling women, the walk to Em- 
maus, the incredulous ten and the 
doubting Thomas convinced. The ap- 
nearncc to "above 5C0 brethren at 
once;'' the "clay of pentecost;" the con- 
version of Saul and every conversion 
from that day to this; the sainted dead 
who have left glorious testimonies; the 
words of the crucified one. "fear not, I 
am the first and the last, I am he that 
liveLh and was dead, and, behold, I am 
alive foreverinore, amen, and have the 
keys of hell (grave) and death."— Rev. 
1, 17. 18. The churches, bibles, univer- 
sities, missionaries, preachers, prayer 
meetings, Sunday schools and Chris- 
tian endeavors give a volume of indis- 
putable evidence. 

"Would you with a piece of rock pre- 
vent his egress from the night of the 
grave into the twilight of the day? 

Sooner may you roll a stone against 
the eastern heavens that the morning 
sun should not rise out of his grave of 
night, than the gravestone of the 
Prince of Life should prevent his com- 
ing forth to the Light of Day."— Tho- 

lock. 

"Vain the stone, the watch, the seal, 
Christ hath burst the gates of hell. 
Death in vaiii forbade him rise; 
Christ hath opened Paradise." 

We want no funeral dirges hero- 
today. We have not come to perform 
obsequies. We stand not by a dead 
Christ this morning, but by an empty 
tomb. Emptied not by the waste and 
decomposition of ages, but by the om- 
nipotence and glory of God ! 

"He lay." but he arose, "He came 
orth." Damn. -indeed is the 

f 



•loinb robbed of its inmate. There lay 
the winding sheet, the napkin, the 
whole paraphernalia of the dead, fold- 
ed and in order. But the bird has 
flown — the sound has ceased. All is 
damp, dark and murky. Oh, how 
sad must be the heart in which there is 
no Christ — empty. 

But now Christ is risen from the 
dead and become the first fruits of 
them that slept and life and immor 
tality is brought to light" by him 
who said "I am the resurrection 
and the life:" "I am the light of the 
world, he that followeth me shall not 
walk in darkness, but shall have the 
light of life." 

It is the laying of of the "chief cor- 
ner stone,'" the keystone of the Chris- 
tian system on which all else depends, 
the hub without which we could have 
no wheel, "the foundation that is laid." 
It was on Easter morning that the 
graves were unlocked, the great pear- 
ly gates of salvation' swung wide and 
heaven's palaces offered as-habitations 
for men. 

It is told of Michael Angelo. that on 
examining some of the work of one of 
his students he took his pencil and 
wrote on it "Amplins" — wider. So the 
resurrection of Jesus Christ has writ- 
ten amplius, on the human heart. It 
has widened the scope of our plans and 
purposes. It has added the domain of 
eternity to that of time and taught us 
to live not for the present merely, but 
for the future. It has given us a new 
support through life, and enables us to 
maintain our courage in the severest 
trials. The apostle who cowered be- 
fore the eye of a maid servant before 
his blaster died, was not afraid to face 
the Sanhedrin after he had risen. 

Oh, for a multitude of resurrections 
this morning! Sleeping summer with 



EASTER SERMON 



111 



her robes of green, her perfume of vi- 
olets, her lilies of peace. Resurrection 
from doubt, ignorance, despondency 
and sin, to wisdom courage and purity. 
Oh, for a "begetting again into a live- 
ly — a living hope" and a holy life 
through the gospel of Jesus. A resur- 
rection of faithful service, to him that 
"fainteth not neither is weary." A 
resurrection of commercial honor: 
when a pound shall mean sixteen ounc- 
es; 36 inches, not 27, is a yard, and 
milk shall no longer be a synonym for 
chalk and water, or sand for sugar, A 
resurrection of truthfulness, when ly- 
ing lips shall close, and evil tongues 
shall cease their babbling. A resur- 
restion of the lost arts of the ages, un- 



til all shall be skilled in every fine 
work." 

A resurrection of literature to the 
brightness of the transfiguration, rath- 
er than the gray of the present, for 
the sun of progress is just now dawn- 
ing. Oh, for a resurrection of peace 
that will lay in the grave for all eter- 
nity the sword and its carnage. Oh, 
for iucarnations and resurrections of 
the Ciirist life in all of us; 

For by the ruling powers of heaven 
All virtues are to mortals given. 
Wisdom is theirs— from them are sprung 
The active hand, the fluent tongue. 

— Pindar. 

Come and see where once Christ lay, 
Take courage from this Easter-day. 






W - * *C 



"^ * 

J 




^^ 


^ 


-<1^ 




* 




«8 




<* 


< 


« 


*c 


<«c c 


< 


< 




,-. 


; 




£ 


err 


" 


• 












^r 






SfSf 














c 









cfrc r c 












*3& 

<JKc 



*T 



cue <T 
CO <K 
C4X <§E 






c<sc 

<rc«c 
CC<C 



^x Tec <c<: C<x * C< cd C <^i ( <3CC<<i C 



r cccr<7 

< c<aar<s * 



TT«TY 



c -« <scc 






C4C <f 



>." <r< 









<£" ess <ac 

<C CC <3S 



_:« car 



' ! recreate > "» 



j frac 



^p cc occ-^c 






^4C 



OCT CCC C < « 

« OC1'- Cc^ccc 



C <^ 




ran 



